Classic EBI #100: What Comics Do I Love?

This week, my friends, I’m celebrating a milestone. It’s the big, big 400th edition of Everything But Imaginary, my weekly comic book column at CXPulp.com! I’m highly excited about it, and decided to take this opportunity to explain, once and for all, just why I read comic books. I’ll give you a hint. It’s got a lot to do with potential.

Everything But Imaginary #400: Why Do I Read Comics

And as part of the celebration, in this week’s Classic EBI, I’m stepping out of order a little bit. Column #93 was scheduled to be next, but since I’m celebrating this milestone, I thought it would be nice to go back and celebrate the column’s very first milestone, EBI #100, from February 2, 2005. Let’s go, shall we?

EBI #100 SUPER-SIZED SPECTACULAR: WHAT COMICS DO I LOVE?

It’s hard to believe, I know, but for 100 Wednesdays now comic book fans have had something more to look forward to than just this week’s crop of fresh comic books: we’ve had Everything But Imaginary. Hard to believe I’ve been writing it for this long, hard to believe that I still haven’t run out of things to write about. It’s a wonderful feeling.

As comic fans, 100 is a huge number for us. It’s rare, especially these days, for something to last 100 installments, so when it happens it’s cause for celebration. How, then, do I commemorate EBI 100?

Part of my mission statement here, folks, is to talk about what makes good comics good. And that’s my favorite part of this job: turning people on to new comics, explaining why I think something is great or talking about how to make it better. So how better to handle this column than to talk about the greatest comic book properties I’ve ever read?

Then I hit another problem, because when I made my top 10 list, almost all of them were superhero properties, and comic books are so much more than that, and I didn’t want to focus just on superheroes.

Then I thought: “Duh. It’s my 100th issue, and I can make it super-sized if I want to.”

So that’s what you’re getting, friends — my 10 favorite superhero properties and my 10 favorite other comic properties. There won’t be any big surprises on this list. You’ve been reading for 100 columns now, you know what I like and I don’t like. The important thing here, the thing I hope you take away from this… is the why.

My 10 Favorite Non-Superhero Comics

10. G.I. Joe: Yeah, I’m a big kid and I know it. But that’s why this property is so great to me. Every little boy wants to play Army Man — well, G.I. Joe takes that concept to the extreme. And the greatest Joe tales ever were told in the comics — first in Larry Hama’s legendary run at Marvel, then with Josh Blaylock and Brandon Jerwa at Devil’s Due. What’s more, this is the property that jumpstarted the 80s nostalgia craze, and is one of the few survivors. Because it’s still really, really good. This property has grown and matured along with its audience. Guys my age fell in love with this comic book as kids. It’s amazing that, even as adults, it’s one of the best comics on the market.

9. PVP: Man, what’s left to say about Scott Kurtz and PVP? Birthed as a webtoon, turned into a successful comic, this title lampoons video games, office politics, pop culture, television, movies and everything else. It’s what Dilbert would be with a giant blue troll and actual punchlines. For me, to be actually funny, something has to be smart too, and PVP scores that in spades. I read it every day on PVP Online and I still geek out every time an issue arrives at the comic shop.

8. Strangers in Paradise: Terry Moore’s labor of love was one of the first serious, non-superhero comics I ever got into. It’s basically a love story about Francine Peters and Katchoo, but sometimes it’s a triangle with David or a quadrangle with Casey or a pentagon with Freddie. Sometimes it’s a mob drama. Sometimes it’s a sitcom. Sometimes it’s a romance. This is a title that can reinvent itself not just from story to story, but within the same issue. Moore’s work is unceasingly experimental and consistently interesting, and I love that.

7. Sandman. Neil Gaiman’s masterpiece, Sandman was the flagship title of DC’s Vertigo line, and is still a top seller in bookstores. Using bits and pieces of DC’s existing superhero universe, Gaiman instead crafted a haunting fantasy tale about the king of the Dreaming and his Endless siblings. Sandman is the only comic book ever to win a World Fantasy Award (and is likely to remain so, because the members of the Award federation were so incensed that a lowly comic book won that they changed the rules so they are no longer eligible). It’s a truly literary work, and it’s a book with a lot of crossover appeal as well, drawing in people who ordinarily wouldn’t read comics and showing them how much potential the art form has.

6. Fables: This is by far the youngest property on either of these lists, and it is a testament to how good it is that I’m mentioning it in this column at all. The brainchild of Bill Willingham, Fables takes all those fairy tale and storybook characters we read about as a child and casts them together in a bold new epic — alternately a drama and a comedy, it’s fast, smart, clever and engaging. Five years ago I never would have believed I’d be pulling for a reconciliation between Snow White and the Big Bad Wolf or reading stories about Cinderella pulling a Mata Hari routine on Ichabod Crane, but I’m reading them now. And I run — run — every month to see if it’s in my advance pack of reviews, because if there’s anything I like more than Fables, it’s telling people how good it is.

5. Archie: That’s right. America’s Favorite Teenager is making my Top 10 list. And you know why? Because it’s sweet. And innocent. And wholesome. And it’s something that each and every one of us can relate to at some point in our lives. I’d wager that at least 75 percent of comic book fans, at some point or another, have read an Archie comic. You have the love triangles, the goofy buddies, the brainiacs, the bullies, the jocks, the nerds, and it’s all wrapped up in a package that is perfect to hand to kids and entice them into reading comic books. If I ever have kids, when the time comes for them to learn how to read, you can bet that Archie is going to be part of the curriculum.

4. Uncle Scrooge: I love Uncle Scrooge for many of the same reasons I love Archie — it’s wholesome and great for kids and something we’ve all read, but Scrooge has even more going in its favor. A great Uncle Scrooge story is never dated, never too low for adults to read, never too highbrow for kids. And while Archie is primarily suited for slapstick comedy, Scrooge does it all. Want high adventure? Let’s go on a treasure hunt. Want romance? Weave the tale of Scrooge’s lost love, Glittering Goldie. Sci-fi? Fantasy? Monsters? Pirates? Cowboys? Mythology? Politics? Corporate scandal? With Scrooge and his nephews, you can tell just about any kind of story you can imagine.

3. The Spirit: The most famous work of Will Eisner is a borderline superhero comic (he does wear a mask and fight crime, after all), but it’s more than that. It’s a crime drama at its heart, but Eisner did some fantastic things with it. He delved into fantasy, comedy and horror — as many genres as Scrooge does, in fact, but he did it for a more adult audience and revolutionized comics while he was at it. There’s still one Spirit story by its creator left unpublished, a crossover with Michael Chabon’s Escapist, and I cannot wait for that book to see print.

2. Bone: This is one of those rare comic books to crop up in the last ten to fifteen years that will almost certainly become a classic. Written and drawn by Jeff Smith, this epic fantasy followed the three Bone cousins after they were driven out of their home and into a valley filled with strange and terrifying creatures. Smith tricked us all by playing up the first dozen issues or so of the comic as a lighthearted comedy before delving straight into hardcore, full-out Tolkien levels of fantasy. (Tolkien played the same trick with The Lord of the Rings, if you look at the early lighthearted chapters of the first book.) If you like fantasy, you have to read this comic, and you’ve got plenty of options to do so. You can hunt down the nine volumes of the series. You can put out a chunk of change for the ginormous one-volume edition. Or you can even get the new digest-sized reprints that Scholastic is now printing… in full color.

1. Peanuts: If you did not see this coming, go back and reread the last 99 EBIs. Charles M. Schulz was, quite simply, the wisest man who ever lived. A genius, a philosopher, a teacher, a friend. And he did all of his great work through a round-headed kid, a crazy dog, a kid who couldn’t let go of his blanket and a loudmouthed fussbudget. People don’t give him enough credit for the brilliance of Charlie Brown — when you’re reading that strip, he is you. His face is deliberately blank and featureless that anybody can project themself into his situation. We’ve all fallen for the little red-haired girl or lost the big baseball game. We’ve all gone to friends for advice only to be mocked. We’ve all fallen. We’ve all hurt. We’ve all cried. We’ve all laughed. And we do it all through the Peanuts gang. To read his comic, it would be easy to argue that Schulz thought the secret of life was, no matter what, to never stop trying to kick that football. It would be far harder to argue that he was wrong.

And now for the moment that far too many of you probably skipped down to read when I explained how this week’s column was going to work…

My 10 Favorite Superhero Comics

10. Batman: Some of you are probably stunned that he’s so low on this list, others may be stunned he’s on here at all. But remember, this is my list and I can do it however I want. Batman is a modern-day fable, something that all of us can look to and wonder. What we have, basically, is a normal human who had everything that mattered taken away from him, but instead of falling prey to the night, he conquered it and elevated himself to the status of the gods. His prime motivator is guilt — he believes, on some subconscious level, that he can bring his parents back and atone for the sin of surviving by spending his entire life fighting criminals. He’s probably the deepest, most complex superhero there is.

9. Captain Marvel: And I mean the real Captain Marvel — not Mar-Vell, not Genis, not Monica Rambeaux. I mean Billy Batson, a poor orphaned boy who was led down a dark tunnel to a wizard who, upon saying the magic word Shazam!, transforms into the world’s mightiest mortal. As deep and complex as Batman is, Captain Marvel is the opposite — simple and innocent. He is a good-hearted child given the ability to do great things. Heck during the Underworld Unleashed storyline, when the demon Neron was questing for the purest soul in existence, everyone automatically assumed he wanted Superman. When he made his move for Cap, they were proven wrong. Is it any wonder that, in his heyday, he was the most popular superhero there was? More than Batman, Superman or Captain America, kids of the 1940s dreamed of being Captain Marvel. And there’s something beautiful about that.

8. Justice Society of America/Justice League of America/Teen Titans: Am I cheating by lumping these three properties together? I don’t think so, because I think of them as being different stages of the same thing: a legacy of heroism. The JSA was the first team of superheroes in any medium. They are the old guard. The elder statesmen. They’ve done it all and seen it all, and usually did it better than you. They are everything you want to be. The JLA is the pinnacle of the modern heroes. They are the first line of defense. The strongest, the bravest, the fastest, the truest. If your world needs saving, these are the guys you call to do it. The Teen Titans are the future. They’re the heroes-in-training. They look at the JSA and JLA and know that this is what they have to live up to, that the world will some day need them to become that. And they don’t back down from that crushing responsibility — because they’re already heroes.

7. Captain America: Forget politics for a moment. I don’t care who you voted for in the last election or where you live in the world or if you’re from a red state, a blue state or a marzipan state. Think about what Captain America symbolizes. A scrawny little boy who so loved his country, so loved the ideals of freedom and democracy, that he served himself up as an experiment to save the world from evil — and in doing so became the greatest soldier of all time. Someone who fights nearly 70 years later for those same ideals. Someone who is not blind to the problems of the world but who has faith in the goodness of the human spirit to rise above those faults and build something grand. You can’t tell me there’s not something awe-inspiring about that.

6. Spider-Man: Possibly Stan Lee’s greatest creation, Spider-Man is amazing (pun intended) for many of the same reasons as Captain Marvel. It’s the story of a boy given incredible power to go out and do good… but he’s given more complexity because, like Batman, he is driven by guilt. He squandered his gift, used it selfishly, and as a result lost the only father he ever knew. He was the first really relatable superhero — having problems with women, problems with school, problems with money. He’s been called the everyman superhero. That’s definitely one of the things that has made him so great.

5. Green Lantern: I don’t care which Green Lantern is your favorite. Pick one. Alan Scott. Hal Jordan. Kyle Rayner. John Stewart. Guy Gardner. Kilowog. Arisia. Ch’p. Tomar-Re. Relax, gang, I could be going this way for a long time. Green Lantern, at least to the readers, started with one man — Alan Scott. It spread out to become an intergalactic peacekeeping force like none other. Heroes across the entire universe, all brothers and sisters of the ring. When one Green Lantern falls, another takes his place. The Corps will never be gone forever. And no Green Lantern ever fights alone.

4. The Flash: First it was Jay Garrick. Then Barry Allen. Then Wally West. But it wasn’t until Mark Waid really delved into the characters in the late 80s and early 90s that the Flash became what it truly is now — the greatest legacy in comic books. He’s not just a guy with super-speed. The Flash is an ideal. A mantle. A banner that will be worn for a time and then passed down. Bart Allen is next in line after Wally. And after him, there will be more to come, an unbroken line, stretching at least to the 853rd century, for that is as far as we’ve seen. But there will be even more after that, we know. You cannot kill the Flash. You can only kill the person in that mask today.

This, as a brief aside, is the reason that Green Lantern and the Flash compliment each other so well, and why each generation of these characters have formed a true bond. One is the symbol of Justice Universal. The other is the symbol of Justice Eternal.

3. The Legion of Super-Heroes: This is one of the first superhero comics I ever read, thanks to my Uncle Todd, and it remains one of my favorite. The concept has been rebooted and revamped several times over the years, but the core remains the same: a thousand years from now, a group of teenagers bands together, in the spirit of the heroes of old, to protect the universe from evil. It’s as simple as that. It’s also got some of the most diverse, most interesting characters in comics. The group has a fantastic history and, even more, looks to its own history as inspiration. Much like the legacy of the Flash, the Legion of Super-Heroes is about a promise… that even 1,000 years into the future, there will still be heroes, still be people ready to stand against the night, still be people willing to fight, to bleed, to die… to save the world.

2. Fantastic Four: I’ve tricked you by putting this here, you know. Because unlike the last eight items, the Fantastic Four aren’t really superheroes. They are superpowered beings who Reed Richards has cast as superheroes, to make them famous, to atone for his original mistake that stole their normal lives in the first place. No, the FF is much grander than a superhero. The Fantastic Four are explorers. Of what? Anything. Outer space. Inner space. Microspace. Cyberspace. The Negative Zone. The depths of the Amazon. The cold surface of the moon. The burning depths of the human heart. The Fantastic Four are a family, dedicated to plunging the boundaries of knowledge, to seeking out what’s out there beyond the realm of imagination. They are considered the first characters of the “Marvel Age” of comics, but age is not a factor for them. When the stories are written properly, the Fantastic Four is always, always about finding something new, something grand… something fantastic.

1. Superman: He was the first. He remains the greatest. Superman is an incredible tale on many levels. He’s an immigrant. He’s an orphan. He’s an endangered species. He’s an exile. And yet he still found a way to become the greatest hero in the world. I get riled when I hear people call Superman perfect, because that doesn’t sound like they really understand the character, that they’ve only seen the work of poor writers. He struggles against being alone, against his urge to use his power for his own ends, against the ability to become a conqueror and shape the world as he sees fit. His true power comes not from the distant Krypton, but from the heart of America, from Kansas. By raising the most powerful child in the world, Jonathan and Martha Kent are heroes in their own right, giving the world a protector who very easily could have become a despot. The “super” part of his name is not the important part. Far more importantly, he is a man, a man with a good heart and a gentle soul, an iron will and an endless reservoir of courage. He is the most human of us all. He is the human we all wish we could be.

So there you have it. Not just one, not just ten, but twenty of the greatest concepts ever put forth in comics. Not necessarily the most famous or the most popular, but the ones that speak to me more than any other, the ones I love even through the lean years — the Superman Red/Superman Blue fiascos, the spider-clones, the “Ninja Force” nonsense and even in the face of those Bad Writers Who Shall Not Be Named. Because even when these concepts are mishandled, there’s no writer on Earth bad enough to destroy what makes their core work. Even in the bad times, it is only a matter of time until a good writer (I’m looking at you, Gail Simone) finds that core, polishes it, returns it to the light and makes their stories great again.

FAVORITE OF THE WEEK: January 26, 2005

Two months in and Mark Waid and Barry Kitson’s new Legion of Super-Heroes has twice won my “favorite of the week” honor. In issue #2 Brainiac 5 leads a team of Legionnaires to Dream Girl’s homeworld of Naltor, where the youths of the planet have lost their ability to sleep and, with that, their precognitive abilities. It’s part sci-fi mystery, part superhero romp and part political drama. It’s great. Waid has frequently won “Favorite of the Week” for his Fantastic Four work – with that ending, it looks like he’s going to keep that distinction on a regular basis here with Legion.

Blake M. Petit is the author of the superhero comedy novel, Other People’s Heroes, the suspense novel The Beginner and the Christmas-themed eBook A Long November. He’s also the co-host, with whoever the hell is available that week, of the 2 in 1 Showcase Podcast and the weekly audio fiction podcast Blake M. Petit’s Evercast. E-mail him at BlakeMPetit@gmail.com and visit him on the web at Evertime Realms. Read past columns at the Everything But Imaginary Archive Page, and check out his new experiment in serial fiction at Tales of the Curtain.

2 in 1 Showcase Episode 222: A Chat With Francis Manapul

It’s a Showcase first! Last week at Nola Comic-Con, the boys were lucky enough to host a few panel discussions, and we’re bringing the audio to you. This week, we talk with DC superstar artist Francis Manapul about getting started, his evolving art style, his work on Flash, his appearances on the TV show Beast Legends, and a hint about who’s going to be writing his next project. In the picks, Blake recommends Rocketeer Adventures #1! Contact us with comments, suggestions, or anything else at Showcase@CXPulp.com!

Music provided by Music Alley from Mevio.

Episode 222: A Chat With Francis Manapul

Classic EBI #92: What’s So New About It?

In this week’s all-new Everything But Imaginary, I talk about the terrifying news that Seth MacFarlane has been hired to reboot The Flintstones, an in the process pick apart why some reboots work and others don’t.

Everything But Imaginary #399: Runaway Reboots

But moving back to December 8, 2004, I had a particularly pertinent discussion. As rumors swirl about massive renumbering over at DC comics, I back then I was already discussing renumbering and misleading prefixes in…

Everything But Imaginary #92: What’s So New About It?

In the land of comic books, there is one thing you can be certain of — publishers will never tire of starting a comic book over with a new issue #1 in the desperate attempt to boost sales. We’ve seen it with Captain America and Iron Man, we’ve seen it with Catwoman and, soon, She-Hulk… we’ve even seen it with stalwarts like Wolverine. Legion of Super-Heroes is about to start volume five of that title. And if you don’t mind, I’d rather not even discuss the Punisher.

This drives the people who care about such things (geeks like me) absolutely crazy, if for no other reason than that we’ve got to constantly remember which volume of a series we’re referring to while having a debate. (“It happened in Fantastic Four #12!” “Which Fantastic Four #12?” “Er…”)

If a company feels the need to relaunch a title with a new #1, I prefer them to at least make a slight alteration to the title. Give it a subtitle, for instance — instead of Doctor Strange Vol. 3, the series was Doctor Strange: Sorcerer Supreme. That was cool. Or make a massive alteration that still keeps the feel of the book, such as when Justice League of America gave way to simply JLA.

There’s one other trick, of course, that publishers can pull out to make it seem like they’re launching another title instead of repackaging an old one, a trick that’s been used frequently of late: stick a “new” at the beginning of it. This isn’t a recent trick, it’s been happening at least as far back as the 80s, when Marv Wolfman and George Perez resurrected Teen Titans as The New Teen Titans. Marvel Comics turned Defenders into New Defenders towards the end run of that title, and even Jim Valentino turned his ShadowHawk property over to Kurt Busiek as New ShadowHawk for seven issues.

Why “new”? Well, what word has better connotations to drag in readers? “New” means it’s bold and exciting and innovative! (And even if the comic isn’t really any of those things, that “new” stamp gives it the feel that it is.) But something can only remain “new” for so long. Even if the book was still good, after a while the “New” Teen Titans weren’t all that new anymore. Eventually DC realized that and changed the title of the book again…

…to New Titans.

Okay, so maybe they kind of missed the point there. But eventually New Titans gave way to Teen Titans Vol. 2, which gave way to The Titans, which gave way to Teen Titans Vol. 3, which if nothing else proves that whoever is in charge of titles at DC Comics has learned absolutely nothing.

These days, though, it’s Marvel that’s really letting the “new” banner fly high. It started when Grant Morrison took over the adjectiveless X-Men comic book and asked that “New” be added to the title. This was done for two reasons:

1. Morrison was trying a totally new take on the superhero genre (well, kinda, except that what he actually did was wallow in the existing superhero genre even as he deconstructed it).

2. It made for a really cool logo that could be read the same upside-down as rightside-up.

When Morrison left the title changed back to just plain X-Men, but Marvel apparently liked the New X-Men moniker and applied it to another title they already had — New Mutants. Volume two.

(Brief aside here, New Mutants, New Warriors and a few other such books don’t quite fall into the category I’m talking about here because they weren’t originally repackaged versions of old titles — although each would be cancelled and spawn a second volume — but rather actual original concepts that were given the “new” label right off the bat to make them appear bold and exciting and innovative, even if they weren’t.)

So New Mutants Vol. 2 became New X-Men: Academy X. Well points to Marvel for at least giving it a subtitle. Interestingly, I think the “new” label fits this book much better than it ever did Morrison’s. While I loved that run, don’t misunderstand me, this book simply feels “new”er. Nunzio DeFilips and Christina Weir have done a great job crafting original characters who aren’t really superheroes, but students that are acutely aware that some day they may be called upon to become the next generation of X-Men whether they want to or not. It makes for one of my favorite reads every month.

This may even be one of those rare titles to not outgrow the “new” label, assuming it lasts that long. The book is about Xavier’s school, after all. It’s not that big a leap to imagine these students graduating a few at a time and a new class coming in to take their place, thereby keeping the book perpetually fresh.

And finally we come to the two big “new” titles to hit the stands in recent weeks — New Thunderbolts and New Avengers. The original Thunderbolts series, for those who don’t recall, was about a group of villains who first masqueraded as heroes in a scheme for domination, then had a change of heart and became heroes in fact. In this incarnation, a few remaining original members of the team begin it again with the hopes of recruiting other villains and giving them the same chance they had at redemption. Is it “new” though?

Well… yes and no.

About half of the characters are new to the title, and the returning characters (Mach-IV, Songbird and Atlas) are cast in decidedly different roles than when they were first on the team. The format of the book, however, seems the same as the original — lots of conspiracies, lots of questions about people’s loyalty and even a big shocker twist ending at the conclusion of the first issue. Not that any of these are a problem, mind you, but they do tone down the “new” aspect.

What about New Avengers? Well, the old Avengers disbanded after several of them died and one of them got crazy and a few of them quit, so when there was a major jailbreak at Ryker’s Island, somebody had to come in and fix things. Who’s that gonna be?

Good question.

We’re still not 100 percent sure who the final “New” Avengers lineup will be, but the safe money seems to include Captain America, Iron Man and Spider-Man (all of whom have been Avengers in the past), Luke Cage, Spider-Woman and Daredevil (who have at least associated with the Avengers), Wolverine (who already stars in four Marvel Universe titles a month and has absolutely no business being in this book but decided to jump on board since he was barred from being on the permanent roster of New X-Men: Academy X on the grounds that he wasn’t technically a student), and Sentry (who was once a bigwig in the Marvel Universe although nobody remembers him anymore).

So “new” is kind of stretching it here.

Not to say it’s bad, mind you. For the most part I enjoyed the premiere issue and I’m anxious to see how it goes. I’m just not sure how Marvel will still be able to justify having a “new” on the title by issue #25 or so, unless they plan to argue that the original Avengers lasted for 503 issues, so this team will still be newer at least until they hit 504.

Basically what this all boils down to is sort of a note to the comic book publishers — look for new adjectives. No pun intended. Now I’ve got to get back to work on my next book — it was going to be called 14 Days of Asphalt, but now I find myself leaning towards New Other People’s Heroes.

FAVORITE OF THE WEEK: December 1, 2004

This week was easier than expected for me to choose. New Avengers was good, Monolith is always a treat and G.I. Joe continues to impress, but nothing scored as high on the ol’ fave-o-meter as Y: The Last Man #29. Yorick, the last man on Earth, is dying. Agent 355 is looking for the ring he lost on the crazy premise that it somehow may have kept him alive. Dr. Mann puts all the pieces together. Brian K. Vaughan writes a lot of comic books every month, but none of the others I’ve read even approach how good this one is.

Blake M. Petit is the author of the superhero comedy novel, Other People’s Heroes, the suspense novel The Beginner and the Christmas-themed eBook A Long November. He’s also the co-host, with whoever the hell is available that week, of the 2 in 1 Showcase Podcast and the weekly audio fiction podcast Blake M. Petit’s Evercast. E-mail him at BlakeMPetit@gmail.com and visit him on the web at Evertime Realms. Read past columns at the Everything But Imaginary Archive Page, and check out his new experiment in serial fiction at Tales of the Curtain.

2 in 1 Showcase Episode 214: The News From C2E2

It’s all Blake again this week as we delve into the news from the Chicago Comic and Entertainment Expo, or C2E2 for short! The new Wonder Woman costume, the newest cast member for The Dark Knight Rises, the new creative teams for Punisher, Daredevil, Moon Knight and Ghost Rider… and are Captain America and The Flash both re-launching again? Good grief. It’s a double pick this week, Justice League: Generation Lost #21 and Ruse #1! Contact us with comments, suggestions, or anything else at Showcase@CXPulp.com!

Music provided by Music Alley from Mevio.

Episode 214: The News From C2E2

My Saturday Morning Shuffle

A little while ago, chatting with Erin and Mark on Facebook, we call came to the conclusion that there just aren’t any good shows on Saturday mornings anymore. Certainly no decent cartoons. And I decided that the only way to remedy this, at least until I take over television programming, is to get an enormous DVD player capable of holding dozens of discs and placing the episodes on random shuffle. So I looked at my DVD collection to decide what I would put on that shuffle if I could do so right now…

• Animaniacs Volume 1 (I so gotta find the rest of these)
• Challenge of the Super-Friends Vol. 1, 2
• Chip and Dale Rescue Rangers Vol. 1
• Count Duckula Season 1
• DC Super-Heroes: The Filmation Adventures
• Danger Mouse Seasons 1 and 2
• Darkwing Duck Vol. 1
• Ducktales Vol. 1-3
• Dungeons and Dragons: The Beginning
• Exosquad Season 1
• Flintstones: The Complete Series
• Galaxy High Vol. 1
• Garfield and Friends Vol. 1-5
• Legion of Super-Heroes Vol. 1-3
• Looney Tunes: The Golden Collection Vol. 1-2 (I desperately need the rest of these)
• Max Fleischer’s Superman
• The Muppet Show Seasons 1-3 (Not a cartoon, but I dare you to tell me these don’t deserve to be here)
• Peanuts 1960s Collection, 1970s Collection Vol. 1-2
• Pinky and the Brain Vol. 2 (Still need more!)
• The Pixar Short Films Collection (Because they’re cool)
• The Real Ghostbusters Vol. 1
• Rocky and Bullwinkle Season 1
• Star Trek: The Animated Series
• Star Wars Animated: Droids & Ewoks
• Superman: The Animated Series Vol. 2
• Tiny Toon Adventures Season 1 Vol. 2
• TransFormers: The Complete First Season Vol. 1
• Walt Disney Treasures: Mickey Mouse in Black and White; Silly Symphonies Vol. 1; Oswald the Lucky Rabbit; The Chronological Donald Vol. 2; The Complete Goofy

Looking at this list, my collection seems woefully inadequate. Why have I never finished the Looney Tunes collections? Or Animaniacs, Tiny Toons, or Pinky and the Brain? Why don’t I have the Batman cartoons, Batman Beyond, or the Justice League? (Why has Warner Brothers not yet released a complete set of Static Shock?)

:sigh:

Someday, my friends. Some. Day.

Classic EBI #78: Canceled Comic Cavalcade (and a tribute to Dwayne McDuffie)

Yesterday the news broke that Dwayne McDuffie, one of the smartest, most original writers working in mainstream comics, unexpectedly passed away. This weeks’ Everything But Imaginary column is my little tribute to him, and my feelings on just what made him so great.

Everything But Imaginary #388: McDuffie Proved Diversity About More Than Race

Traveling back in time, though, we go to September 1, 2004. In this week’s Classic EBI, I talked about a few comics I loved that were all getting canceled at about the same time… It happens, sadly, far too often.

Canceled Comic Cavalcade

They’re doing it to me again.

It happens to all of us every so often — we start reading a comic book, we get to love it, get invested in it… but since it’s only us and about three other people who feel that way, the book gets cut off before its prime. So Sentinel fans, I feel your pain. Supergirl lovers, your loss is my own. X-Treme X-Men readers… well, you’ve still got like six X-Men books to choose from, so it’s not exactly comparable.

But the reason I’m out of sorts is because DC Comics is pulling the plug on Will Pfiefer’s excellent series H-E-R-O. Pfiefer resurrected the classic Dial “H” for “Hero” concept with this book, about a mysterious dial that granted a person a different superheroic identity each time it was used. While the old versions of this story always kept the dial with one or two bearers who used it over again, in H-E-R-O, the dial traveled from person to person (some deserving, some not), while Robby Reed, the original holder of the dial, tried to track it down again.

A bit more than a year and a half into the run, this book has really hit its stride and Pifefer is telling fantastic stories… just in time to see it die. Why? The same reason most comic books die, sadly — just not enough people buying it.

There are other reasons comics are canceled other than low sales, of course. Sandman ended at issue #75 because Neil Gaiman had finished the stories he wanted to tell. The original Marvel Team-Up title was canceled back in the 80s because it simply became too implausible for Spider-Man to meet up with a new guest star every month. (Of course, this did not stop them from trying it again years later with Spider-Man Team-Up, Marvel Team-Up Vol. 2, Ultimate Marvel Team-Up and, later this year, Marvel Team-Up Vol. 3.) The Legion is being canceled only to be relaunched again under its original title, Legion of Super-Heroes, which should be a great book with Mark Waid and Barry Kitson at the helm.

But no matter what the reason, when a well-written, thought provoking comic book meets its end, it’s a reason to feel down.

Just last week the final issue of Peter Milligan and Mike Allred’s X-Statix hit the stores. Resurrected from the ashes of the old X-Force comic, this series depicted a team of mutants that were celebrities instead of outcasts, but carried with them all too human faults and frailties. I’ve always thought that the outcast storyline is the basic flaw in the X-Men concept — yes, granted, it made for a good allegory for the civil rights movement in the 60s, but in this day and age people with wings or claws or blue fuzz and a tail wouldn’t be shunned from society. They’d be superstars. They’d have endorsements for sneakers and breakfast cereals. They’d appear on every talk show in America talking about how much they had to struggle then go home to their million-dollar mansions and wait for the supermodels to arrive and join them in the hot tub.

Milligan took that reality and showed that you could still tell great stories with characters like that. He made them much more interesting than most other X-books out there, but some people didn’t like it because it was too different, because of Allred’s art style (which ironically, I always thought resembled that of X-Men co-creator Jack Kirby) because it wasn’t what they were used to. I heard a story once — possibly apocryphal but who knows — that when Milligan and Allred started their run, X-Force co-creator Rob Liefeld sent Milligan a copy of X-Force #1, on which he wrote, “Dear Peter, thanks for ****ing up my book.”

Which I also thought was ironic, because those were my exact feelings when Liefeld turned the once-excellent New Mutants series into the “Cable and His X-Stormtroopers” book they called X-Force. New Mutants, then, was another book canceled for a bad reason – to be turned into a different title entirely.

The point is, no matter why X-Statix is ending, I’m sorry to see it go, and I can only hope that this means Allred will soon be returning to his baby, Madman, which has been a favorite of mine for years.

Sometimes fan response can save a book that’s been slated for cancellation. If I were to count all the times Spider-Girl was supposed to get the axe, only to be rescued by outraged reader response, I’d use up both hands and have to take off at least one shoe. Other times, no amount of reader response can save a title, as we learned earlier this year when the last issue of Captain Marvel faded from sight.

We all know it will happen again. Every one of us has a book in our pull folder that we dearly love but that we know may not last another 12 issues. And there’s only one way to prevent it. Talk the book up. Tell people about it. Tell people why you love it and try to convince them to give it a try. Ronée makes jokes all the time about me reading She-Hulk, teasing me about having a thing for green women. Well, I’m not gonna deny that fantasy has cropped up from time to time, but that’s not why I read this comic. I read it because Dan Slott has crafted a smart, funny superhero series that celebrates continuity at a time where everybody else seems to be ignoring it. In just six months it has become a favorite title of mine… but it’s not clocking in at Batman numbers, so people get nervous about it being cancelled. So I tell people — if you’re not reading She-Hulk… start.

Other fans go to even greater lengths — I’ve heard of an effort by some Fallen Angel fans to cut a deal with She-Hulk fans: you buy our book and we’ll buy yours, and both titles will get a sales boost. It’s an unusual pairing — in everything from theme, tone, writing style and genre, I really can’t think of two titles less similar than She-Hulk and Fallen Angel. But supposedly the movement has the blessing of the writers of both titles, and hey, if it helps stop someone’s favorite comic book from getting canceled, who can complain about that?

But no matter what, chances are a book you love will get the axe sooner or later. When it happens, don’t despair. All of the great stories you’ve read are still there, sitting in your long box. And don’t give up on the title either. Sometimes love for a book can bring it back even after the most ignoble death. If you don’t believe me, come back in November when the first issue of New Thunderbolts hits the stands. (For a non-comic situation where this happened, see the Fox cartoon Family Guy.)

Heck even X-Men was canceled for a few years once upon a time. Now you can’t escape the mutants.

It may be too late to make a difference, but everybody out there, go out and buy a copy of H-E-R-O while you still can. Love it. Enjoy it. Maybe even cajole DC to resurrect it. And next time a book you love is on the brink — don’t just sit there. Spread the love.

FAVORITE OF THE WEEK: August 25, 2004

For the second week in a row Bill Willingham managed to nap the top spot on my reading list, and for the second week in a row, it wasn’t for Fables. Batman #631 closed off the first act of the “War Games” storyline in fantastic fashion. With Tim Drake’s high school under siege, Batman, Nightwing and Batgirl break in to save the students before any more blood is shed. This book really gets into the heart of the Batman mythos, particularly what makes Robin tick, and the finale will have major repercussions for the future of the entire line. “War Games” is already becoming one of the best Bat-family crossovers of all time.

Blake M. Petit is the author of the superhero comedy novel, Other People’s Heroes, the suspense novel The Beginner and the Christmas-themed eBook A Long November. He’s also the co-host, with whoever the hell is available that week, of the 2 in 1 Showcase Podcast and the weekly audio fiction podcast Blake M. Petit’s Evercast. E-mail him at BlakeMPetit@gmail.com and visit him on the web at Evertime Realms. Read past columns at the Everything But Imaginary Archive Page, and check out his new experiment in serial fiction at Tales of the Curtain.

 

2 in 1 Showcase Episode 209: DC Universe Online and More!

 

Blake and Kenny sit down, a month after the game’s release, to talk about their experiences in the new world of DC Universe Online. Afterwards, the guys start bouncing all over the world of comic book news — Flashpoint, Fear Itself, the death in Fantastic four and much more! In the picks, Blake is ecstatic to welcome back Love and Capes: Ever After #1. Contact us with comments, suggestions, or anything else at Showcase@CXPulp.com!

Music provided by Music Alley from Mevio.

Episode 209: DC Universe Online and More

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2 in 1 Showcase Episode 204: 2010-The Year in Review

A little later than they would have liked, but Blake and Kenny are coming at you this week with their look back at 2010 in comics and geek culture. In this mammoth episode, the guys dish on big events for the publishers, the characters, the multimedia properties, and take a look ahead into 2011. It’s the biggest Showcase of the year! Contact us with comments, suggestions, or anything else at Showcase@CXPulp.com!

Music provided by the Music Alley from Mevio.

Episode 204: 2010-The Year in Review

Classic EBI #70: Where Credit is Due

It’s the end of the year, friends, and in this week’s new Everything But Imaginary, I’m casting my eyes back to the best of 2010. The best comic books, movies, TV shows, and prose novels of the year are all in my head, and I’m giving you my picks!

Everything But Imaginary #380: The Best of 2010

But let’s travel back in time now, friends, to July 7, 2004, a couple of weeks after I ticked everybody off by talking about characters that I thought were overrated. To balance the scales, this week I discussed characters that don’t get the respect they deserve…

Everything But Imaginary #70: Where Credit is Due

Where credit is due

Blake’s Universal Rules of the Universe #42: If you want to get people screaming at each other on a comic book site, say something bad about Magneto.

For those of you who came in late, a couple of weeks ago I did a column about comic book characters that, in my own humble opinion, which of course is right, get way more credit than they deserve. The hackneyed, the overused, the unjustly worshiped. I expected people to get fired up about this. I did not expect a 19-page diatribe on morality spurred by a few people trying to justify genocide by saying a killer is really a sweet, cuddly teddy bear.

This week, friends, we’re going to take the opposite approach. I’m going to talk about characters who have been around for a long time, but who aren’t as respected or looked up to as they deserve to be. Now before anyone starts talking about who can beat these guys in a fight, my argument has nothing to do with that. Power levels are irrelevant. I’m talking about good, enjoyable characters that can be milked for great stories, but just aren’t held in the same regard as some of their lesser peers. I’m talking about giving some credit where credit is due.

And we’re starting with one of my personal favorites that everyone else turns up their noses at — Captain Marvel. And no, I don’t mean Genis — frankly, I found that Captain Marvel to be a fairly bland character, raised up only by some clever writing by Peter David. I’m talking about the real Cap, the big red cheese, wielder of the power of Shazam. Created in 1940 and defined by the likes of C.C. Beck and Otto Binder, this character was a young orphaned boy who was led down an abandoned subway tunnel to meet an ancient, dying wizard. The wizard gave the boy six gifts — Solomon’s wisdom, Hercules’ strength, Atlas’ stamina, Zeus’ power, Achilles’ courage and Mercury’s speed, and told him he could call upon these powers by saying the wizard’s name… Shazam! Doing so transformed young Billy Batson into the world’s Mightiest Mortal and, for a time, the world’s most popular comic book character, even outselling Superman.

In this day and age — yeah, it’s a goofy concept. It’s almost silly. But there’s something beautifully pure and innocent about the character. Even during the Underworld Unleashed miniseries, when the demon Neron wanted to possess the purest soul in existence, most heroes assumed he meant Superman, but in the end, it was Captain Marvel all along.

Besides just the purity of the character, the dichotomy of a child posing as an adult superhero is a fertile ground for great storytelling, and I love the fact that Geoff Johns is finally doing something with it in JSA, putting Billy in a teenage romance with Stargirl. It’s perfectly innocent, but it raises eyebrows among those who don’t know he’s really a teenager himself.

He’s just a great character, but a lot of readers seem to feel the need to down everyone created before 1962, and that’s just not right. Hopefully Jeff Smith’s upcoming miniseries will finally put him in the spotlight he deserves.

Since there was a member of the X-Men on the “overrated” list, it’s only fair that one makes the “underrated” list as well… I’ve always loved The Beast. Basically what you have in this character is a brilliant biologist with big ol’ arms and legs and incredible agility who accidentally turned himself blue and furry. Unlike some characters, though, he’s usually shown as being quite comfortable with his change, remaining just as smart and witty as ever.

In New X-Men (or was it X-Treme where it started? Oh, it doesn’t matter) he underwent an even further mutation, becoming more catlike, and in the current Astonishing X-Men storyline it’s starting to look like he’s not as comfortable with that change. Personally, I like it, I think it makes him more unique.

What made the Beast fun for for me is that he didn’t sulk and mope about his transformation, he enjoyed it. So he’s blue and furry, so what? You know there are women out there who like that sort of thing. Just have fun with it!

Just on sheer enjoyment, Beast is my favorite X-character, but he’s often overshadowed by the likes of Wolverine or Rogue or (ugh) Gambit. I say put him on the new Avengers team again and let him get done up right.

My next pick isn’t a single character at all, but rather an entire team that doesn’t get the notice from fandom it deserves. No… not a team, a Legion. the Legion of Super-Heroes, to be precise. In the 31st century, a band of superpowered teenagers from across the galaxy have been brought together to serve as protectors of the universe. It’s such a simple concept, but such a great one. The Legion has a vast array of characters with different powers, homeworlds, cultures and belief systems. With so many different factors to play with, the storytelling potential is virtually unlimited.

Plus, it was a groundbreaking concept when it was created in the 50s. Characters died, characters quit, emotions ran high and feelings conflicted. The Legion was doing the teen angst thing before the first X-Men got their yellow spandex back from the tailor. With so many different characters, in history, personality and power types, no matter how good a writing team is, there is always more room to mine for great stories.

Dan Abnett and Andy Lanning just wrapped up a fantastic five-year run with these characters, but unfortunately, they didn’t set fire to the sales charts. Fortunately, though, there’s still plenty of excitement to go around. Gail Simone is taking her crack next, followed by a crossover with the Teen Titans before the title is handed off to the highly capable hands of Mark Waid and Barry Kitson. The future looks bright for the Legion, but there are so many things I’d like to see done with them… people often ask me what comic book I’d most like to write if given the chance. It’s not Superman or Batman or even Fantastic Four. This is it, baby, right here.

Moving on… Superman is definitely my all-time favorite comic book character. There’s no question about that. Does anyone want to guess who number two is? Anyone? No, not Spider-Man… not Captain America… who was that who just said NFL Superpro? Somebody hit him for me, please.

No, my second-favorite comic book character, a character who never seems to make the greatest lists, the powerhouse lists, who actually had to die last year before people started to appreciate him, is Benjamin J. Grimm, the ever-lovin’, blue-eyed Thing. If ever a character drew the short straw in the superpower lottery, it was Ben Grimm. His best buddy convinces him to steal a rocket and what happens? They get doused with cosmic rays. One can burst into flame, one can turn invisible, one can stretch… but Ben? He gets turned into a monster made out of orange rock. Unable to feel a warm touch, unable to hold the woman he loves for fear of crushing her, trapped in this monstrous state that even his best friend, the smartest man in the world, cannot cure him of.

This is the sort of thing that turns some people into villains.

Not Ben Grimm.

Oh, he blamed Reed Richards for a long time. Even hated him sometimes, for turning him into a freak. But through it all, he stayed on the side of the angels. He fought the good fight. He eventually learned to forgive and to become part of a family, and in doing so, became one of the greatest comic book characters there ever was. In the Fantastic Four Versus the X-Men miniseries, there was a scene where Rogue swiped Ben’s power and memory to take him out of the fight. The effect stunned her. According to Chris Claremont’s captions, she had expected to find herself kissing a toad, but instead touched the soul of a prince.

Ben keeps kicking. Keeps fighting. He’s the bravest character in comics.

But Wolverine gets the dozen spin-offs and the Punisher gets the miniseries and action figures. And neither one of them are fit to rub turtle wax on his big, orange hide.

Yeah, Ben anchored the old Marvel Two-in-One series for a long time, and even had his own series for a while, but these days it seems like people don’t get what makes him so great. He may be made of stone, but he is the truest diamond in the rough.

Anyway, those are the folks I think don’t get the credit they deserve. What about you guys? Who do you think gets unjustly ignored? Who should be getting more exposure? Who do you think should get the spotlight once in a while?

First person to say Magneto gets hit with a tube sock full of quarters.

FAVORITE OF THE WEEK: June 30-July 3, 2004

Good luck finding this week’s favorite, since it was one of the Free Comic Book Day selections and one in much shorter supply than most of the others I saw, but nothing I read last week made me smile more than Astonish Comics #1. I got the book because of the Herobear and the Kid story by Mike Kunkel. As it turned out, it was an excerpt from the comic that I’d already read, but it was still pleasant. I kept reading, though, and to my amazement, I loved everything in this issue. The Lab was wonderfully silly, Awesome Man seemed to be the sort of thing that taps into the imagination, Spooners was another hysterical strip comic transferred to comic book format, and The Dreamland Chronicles looks like the sort of thing that will appeal to the Shreck demographic. All of them were clever and the artwork was great. Astonish Comics charges each of us to “Remember your childhood… and pass it on.” It is clear that the people who made this comic book believe in that with all their hearts.

Blake M. Petit is the author of the superhero comedy novel, Other People’s Heroes, the suspense novel The Beginner and the Christmas-themed eBook A Long November. He’s also the co-host, with whoever the hell is available that week, of the 2 in 1 Showcase Podcast and the weekly audio fiction podcast Blake M. Petit’s Evercast. E-mail him at BlakeMPetit@gmail.com and visit him on the web at Evertime Realms. Read past columns at the Everything But Imaginary Archive Page, and check out his new experiment in serial fiction at Tales of the Curtain.

 

2 in 1 Showcase Episode 191: News From New York

The New York Comic Con was this weekend, and the Showcase boys spent an hour talking about all the big announcements! Or… at least, the announcements that had been made by the time they recorded this episode! But there’s plenty here, including the big DC and Marvel price drop announcement, future plans for X-Men, Captain America, Supergirl and the Legion of Super-Heroes, Iron Man and X-Men cartoons, Green Lantern and Superman movie news, the comic book returns of Richie Rich and Godzilla, IDW’s daring Infestation crossover, and more! In the picks, Kenny chooses Next Gen Wars #1 and Blake was into Brightest Day #11. Contact us with comments, suggestions, or anything else at Showcase@CXPulp!

Music provided by the Music Alley from Mevio.

Episode 191: News From New York