2012 what are you reading thread

Yeah, lots of that stuff is way below the radar. I'd completely forgotten about HUMAN FLY and the INHUMANS/ETERNALS axis of books. I miss MARVEL FANFARE. Pretty sure DAZZLER should be on that list, too, and I recall it being something of a big deal that it was direct sales shops only (though I could still get it at 7-11).

Still, that only comes out to about 5-7 new titles a year. I wonder how many of them were always intended to be limited runs, if any? Or did they really plan on SHE-HULK being in continuous publication until 2012? (The last is rhetorical.)

Speaking of Inhumans/Eternals, from the hints dropped in the Avengers books and on Newsarama and other sites, my guess is Bendis is going to take over/reboot the Cosmic Marvel U. I assume it's part of a big plan to give Thanos a high profile for a couple of years leading up to Avengers 2.

I bet those'll be the best comics ever. Brian Bendis would totally be my go-to creator for a sense of cosmic grandeur and wonder.

My knowledge abt Bendis is all second-hand but even I sense sarcasm there

Woah. Sorry. The sarcasm indicator's light burnt out. #forever

2012 What You're Listening To Thread:
http://wfmu.org/playlists/shows/46135
Your host, Art Spiegelman, Sophie Crumb, Nick Bertozzi, Ivan Brunetti, Seth, Megan Kelso, Joe Sacco, Gary Groth + some guy who travels to Asia to dress up as Santa also featuring interviews with Kim Deitch and Françoise Mouly

Bendis taking over the cosmic Marvel stuff would be awful! For a while the cosmic corner was the only constantly enjoyable part of Marvel because it wasn't tainted by Bendis' "realism" and tendency to write superhero comics like they were a cop show or war movie.

can't wait for the bendis cosmiccomics, might make them a bit less boring than usual

also, i don't wait to be a parade pisser but ppl are really really overrating mantlo on this thread, the man prob wrote more terrible marvel comics than any other 70s marvel hack

Hooray for terrible Marvel comics of the 70s.

gd luck w/ that run of mantlo-written human flys, matt

or issue 30 of the defenders feat mantlo's tap-dancing supervillain tapping tommy:

http://www.marvunapp.com/Appendix/tappin16.gif

Gladly.

that looks amazing tbh, would happily read a blogpost with like 20 panels from the story

Word.

Rereading SLASH MARAUD. Is insane.

I have that somewhere in the house, I think. Paul Gulacy?

Moench/Gulacy. Yeah. Never been reprinted. DC in 1987 went all mental.

Moench, another guy who really had his moments among expanses of meh. Aztec Ace was awesome.

I absolutely loved MOKF at the time, but it hasn't dated very well.

My favorite Gulacy memory has nothing to do with his work. In the long, great TCJ interview with Tom Sutton, Sutton rattles off some artists of his era including 'The Gulacys'. Groth says something like 'You mean Paul Gulacy'?. Sutton: 'Yeah, aren't there a couple of them?' Groth: 'just one as far as I know'.

WmC I have been trying for ages to identify a MOKF issue from the mists of my recall. It might have been an annual or special or something-- what I remember is that it was a clear ripoff of The Circus Of Dr. Lao. Shang Chi was proceeding past a number of cages with various wise monsters in them, with whom he held dialogues. Do you remember anything like that?

Didn't ring a bell, but I looked through the scans I have and it's #36. Art by Keith Pollard/Sal Trapani -- "Cages of Myth, Menagerie of Mirrors!" lol

Moench, another guy who really had his moments among expanses of meh.

agree w/ this, tho' at the basic level of craft i think moench is a better bet than mantlo or tony isabella (tho' he's no peter b gillis or john warner, either). also, moench was just insanely prolific for marvel during the 1970s, it's kind of amazing that things like MOKF or werewolf by knight had any quality at all

oh, and i've been reading and enjoying the first five or so volumes of XIII by van hamme and vance, and IDW's first Spaghetti Bros translation, by trillo and mandrafina (dunno if DR SUPERMAN still reads any of these threads, but i think he wld really enjoy this volume, as wld p much any fan of torpedo)

My favorite Gulacy memory has nothing to do with his work. In the long, great TCJ interview with Tom Sutton,

P much my only Gulacy memory is a hugely foggy recollection of - I think - him being interviewed in AH, and telling a story about a fan who'd gotten his address out of the phone book and driven across the country to turn up at his door and shake his hand, and Gulacy looking past the kid to see his driving companion rolling around in cut grass on Gulacy's lawn. "Uh, is your friend OK?" enquires a worried Gulacy. "Oh yeah, he's just reconnecting with nature, we've been cooped up in the car for three days," reassures the kid.

And that kid's friend was......... Steve Rude.

[If anyone remembers the details of this better or I have it completely wrong, please correct me!]

slash maraud is a fun time

The thing about Bill Mantlo was he was Marvel of that period's go to guy when books hit the scheduling skids. Pretty much they could give him a comic to write in the afternoon and the guy would have a script back the next morning. I don't doubt that many of the clunkers in that period of comic creators is basically the same thing.

Paul Gulacy was definitely one of my favorite artists when I was a kid. I'd like to track down those two Six from Sirius mini-series him and Moench did for Epic (a few years before Slash Maraud for DC) and give them a read again. I remember liking them but I don't remember the stories at all.

Doug Moench also did quite a few cool things with Batman over the years. If you have never read Doug Moench's two Hugo Strange stories he did in Legend's of the Dark Knight with Paul Gulacy, they are worth searching out. There is also a pretty cool Batman annual he did with JH Williams III that is pretty much Batman meets Master of Kung Fu that is worth searching out.

DC reprinted a LOTDK Moench/W3/Gray three-parter as one of those Presents spined floppies last year

(it wasn't great and of course looked gross on that cheap shiny paper)

MOKF #36! Thank you WmC!

Earl is completely right about much of the bronze age output from both big companies. When you're asked to turn around a script in a night (and that happened more than once), you're going to get junk. It might be entertaining junk, but it's likely to be junk.

Funny, I used to love Gulacy but the work he did on CATWOMAN put me off his art. Maybe it was the inking. I just remember not liking it a lot, probably because it wasn't Cameron Stewart, Javier Pulido or Darwyn Cooke, and those guys made that book. Time was, that was the best book that DC was putting out monthly.

It put off the writer of the book enough that he quit rather than keep seeing his scripts turned into T&A showcases

"It put off the writer of the book enough that he quit rather than keep seeing his scripts turned into T&A showcases"

Do you have a quote from Brubaker that states this? I figured he left for Marvel which is why he left the book.

Gulacy:

At first Ed was on me about making her appear too sexed up. I always drew her really sexy, maybe even too over the top, but that's what people expected. She was this kind of slutty cat burglar. Who are we kidding? (laughter) Every artist wanted to take a crack at her.

Ed pointed out that the outfit is like something a biker chick would wear. Not so form fitting. I disagree to some extent. I feel she should reveal her body form a little more in the outfit. I know what my readers expect of me and I wasn't born yesterday that the rise in sales you mentioned just might have a little something to do with the fact that the readers want to know what Gulacy is doing with that woman's body month to month.

What's considered tastefully done is subjective. In our society, we're bombarded with sexual imagery day and night because advertisers know what people want. Princess Leia didn't become a babe until Lucas had her clothes ripped off and chained to Jabba the Hut. Catwoman is no exception.

We spoke at the beginning but I haven't talked with him in some time. That could actually be taken as a good sign. In other words, the ship is running smoothly.

yyyyyyyeah, that's unpleasant to read

I'd quit before that, mostly 'cause the stories weren't as enthralling. The book felt like it had an ending at #19 or so, but kept on a rollin'.

Eh not that cool got to admit, but really kind of par for the course and times I suppose.

I got no issue with cheesecake, but in the case of Catwoman, they'd shed that entire aspect of the book starting with the new #1. When it suddenly started reverting, I started losing interest. I'm a grownup. I can find better girl art if that's what I want to read.

guess i'm jaded, i'm with earl here... blame julie newmar

Apropos of nothing, just would like to add that Mark Evanier's blog is well worth a comics fan's time, if y'all aren't already reading it. Yesterday's piece about Ben Oda was really nice, and very much an Evanier Blog Post.

http://www.newsfromme.com/

Finally reading the newly-collected FLEX MENTALLO. Must say it's more technically adept, but I miss the candy colors so far.

I haven't been reading many comics the last few months. I got a pretty good stack of newer issues to to read. In the last couple of days though I picked back off my shelf and finished the last issues in Essential Captain America Vol. 3 and some in Essential Avengers Vol. 5, which is basically Steve Englehart's first stories in both titles.

Carl Barks' "Donald Duck: Lost in the Andes" - jesus christ this is some sour stuff. definitely a few in here I will not be reading with my child.

reading Courtney Crumrin with my daughter - suitably goth teen witch stuff

read new Bechdel, My Friend Dahmer book, um, the "Lost in Andes" Carl Barks collection. thinking about going back to Cerebus next, but i'm kinda in the mood for some more lighter reading before diving back into Sim's mind. any suggestions?

i would like to HEARTILY recommend Joe Daly. Dude is amazing. It's too early to even think this but I wanna say he's on a par with Clowes or Woodring.
http://www.avoidthefuture.com/2010/05/interview-joe-daly-creator-of-dungeon.html

i'm also rereading Parasyte, which is great and slowly slowly slowly tunneling through McNeal's Finder

wow, that daly book looks really interesting

Red Monkey is fun but Dungeon Quest is top of the line. Very much like the book you would've written in high school about you and your friends going on a D&D quest except more fucked up and somehow it works. It also has the dash shaw penchant for obsessively charting and updating minutia in the margins. Can't wait until it's available in a complete single volume; it's gonna be in my top 100