Category: Creators

Comics Lowdown: The future of MAD Magazine

Plus: New superhero universe Catalyst Prime, comics to fight fake news, Jillian Tamaki, Rico Renzi’s color palette, and more!

What’s up with MAD Magazine? Mark Evanier lays out a brief history of MAD, which has been part of DC Comics for a long time (it’s complicated!), and updates us on its current status, which is… not good. Like pretty much all print magazines, MAD has been struggling for a while, although Evanier thinks editor John Ficarra has been doing a bang-up job. When the rest of DC packed up and moved to Burbank, California, a while ago, the MAD staff stayed, but they are moving out of their New York office at the end of this year, and DC has not been forthcoming with any news about what will happen next, beyond the fact that the magazine is moving to Burbank and only one staffer, a production artist, will be going with it. The February 2018 issue will be the last one produced by the Usual Gang of Idiots. DC has not made any announcements about what happens next, but Evanier suggests following the blog of artist Tom Richmond, one of the most frequent contributors to the magazine, for updates.

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Comics Lowdown: Camera creeps and Comic Con copyright

Plus: Paco Roca’s Ngozi Ukazu, Mike Norton, a ‘Star Wars Adventures’ update, and the Webcomics Web Archive

Con Creep: Calgary Police are investigating a Twitter account for uploading videos and photos of women and girls without consent, featuring certain body parts in a sexualized way, and even going as far as taking upskirt shots. A Calgary mother is furious that one of the victims is her 14-year old daughter that cosplayed as Harley Quinn at this year’s Calgary Comic and Entertainment Expo. The person responsible took these images only of cosplayers at the Expo, but of women on the streets and in malls as well. Staff Sgt. Cory Dayley of the Calgary Police Service cyber crimes unit said that the images would be classed as voyeurism under the Canadian criminal code. The Twitter account, @CanadaCreep, has been suspended. Late Wednesday afternoon, Calgary police announced they arrested a 42-year-old man on charges relating to voyeurism and publishing voyeuristic images. Police are asking anyone with additional information to contact the at 403-266-1234, case number 17243516.
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New site, The Pushpin, offers prints by comic artists

Featured artists include Ryan North, Kate Beaton, Johnnie Christmas, Michael Cho, Jeff Lemire, Chip Zdarsky and more.

If your walls crave some comic art love, The Pushpin has your hookup. The new site is selling giclée prints featuring artwork by Kate Beaton, Johnnie Christmas, Michael Cho, Jeff Lemire, Sarah Lazarovic, Christian Northeast and many more. In addition, they’re selling Pushpin Originals, which are exclusive prints by Kagan McLeod, Ryan North and Chip Zdarsky — including Zdarsky’s humorous “Solar System” print.

“Science is more important than ever. And even more important than science, is letting people know how much you love science,” Zdarsky said about his Pushpin Original. ”So I wanted to create a poster that could convey to your houseguests that you’d be perfectly at home retweeting Neil deGrasse Tyson, or that you read National Geographic magazines as a kid. My highly informative information graphic on THE SOLAR SYSTEM™ does just that.”

Science teachers may have some issues with it:

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Rainbow Rowell to write ‘Runaways’

Critically acclaimed young adult author tackles Marvel’s teen heroes with villainous parents.

Young adult and contemporary fiction writer Rainbow Rowell dropped a big hint on Twitter earlier this week something was on the horizon, and she was excited about it:

At the annual BookCon festival held in New York, Rainbow Rowell announced her writing duties on the new ongoing series Runaways, with Kris Anka as the illustrator.

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‘Wishless: A Graphic Anthology’ debuts on store shelves today

What if Pinocchio’s wish was never granted, and he never became a real boy?

Wishless: A Graphic Anthology
Sho Uehara was at work when he turned to a fellow employee and said, “Hey! I have this great idea! What if Pinocchio never got his wish and he was just an empty immortal wooden puppet forever?” Nick Johnson thought it was brilliant, and the two of them started spit firing ideas back and forth until they realized they had an anthology on their hands. Wishless: A Graphic Anthology was born.

Wishless is independently created by Calgary artists including Nicole Brunel, Jillian Fleck, Jackson Gee, Joanne Leung, Lyndon Navalta, Nick Johnson, Jarett Sitter and Sho Uehara. Today marks their official launch party and book signing at Shelf Life Books in Calgary, Alberta, Canada.

Wishless creators Nick Johnson and Sho Uehara

“When we realized how intense and how many possibilities there were, I was like, ‘You know, this might be the perfect thing to unify in an anthology,’” Johnson explained. “I wasn’t really into doing anthologies anymore because I had done a bunch already, but by doing one where everyone was tapping that same idea and seeing where they would go with it got us both really excited!”

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Remembering Rich Buckler

Comic legend and prolific artist Rich Bucker passed away on May 19, 2017, from cancer. He was 68. He was best known for his work in the 70s and 80s, creating a definitive style for comic book superheroes for both DC and Marvel comics in the bronze age of comics. He created Deathlok, and his work was seen across a wide variety of licensed merchandise.

With his passing, many tributes were posted throughout the week. A started by writer Clifford Meth, for a Rich Buckler Memorial Scholarship for the Joe Kubert School of Comic Art is currently trending.

Rich Buckler Memorial Scholarship

Jim Beard wrote a blog entry for Marvel.com on Buckler’s accomplishments and creations. He was similarly honoured on the Inkwell Awards’ website, who considered Buckler to be their greatest ambassador.

Other creators and publishers took to their social media channels:

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Donald Trump Slaps ‘Bloom County’ Creator with C&D [UPDATE: It’s a Hoax!]

Update #2: OK, I’m convinced. It’s a hoax. Christian Hoffer did the basic fact-checking I should have done and asked the law firm directly if the letter was real; they denied it.

Update: Have we been taken in by fake news? Uh… There’s at least one source claiming this isn’t real.

If you’re a politician, being lampooned by cartoonists is part of the deal, and even Donald Trump seems to understand that. Where he draws the line is when someone other than him might make some money from it.

Bloom County creator Berkeley Breathed just posted a letter from Trump’s attorney, Marc E. Kasowitz, on his Facebook and Twitter, demanding that he remove an altered image of Trump from his social media posts or (per his client’s wishes, he specifies) “we will ‘have your [redacted] in a sling by lunch.'”

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The Smash Pages family reflects on Tim O’Shea

Earlier this week popular blogger Tim O’Shea passed away after a long battle with cancer. Sadden by the loss, Smash Pages family have a few words we would like to say in remembrance of our colleague and friend.

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The comic industry remembers Tim O’Shea

On the morning of April 30th, Smash Pages lost our co-founder, contributor, and friend, Tim O’Shea from glioblastoma, an aggressive form of brain cancer. Our own JK Parkin wrote a touching memorial on Sunday. Tim’s funeral service will be held at the Our Lady of the Assumption Catholic Church in Atlanta, GA on Saturday, May 20th. More details and virtual guest book can be found here.

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Nick Derington mixes it up with the Young Animal cast

Check out his cover for the comic that came out last weekend on Record Store Day.

I mentioned before that Gerard Way, former My Chemical Romance singer and current curator of DC Comics’ Young Animal line, released a song about Cave Carson for Record Store Day on April 22. (You can hear the song for yourself here).

The 12″ picture disc came with a comic — a “mixtape” sampler featuring material from the various Young Animal comics, along with a framing sequence by Way and artist Michael Allred. If you didn’t make it out to your local record shop this past weekend to see it for yourself, Doom Patrol artist Nick Derington has posted the cover on his Tumblr.

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Quoted: Jillian & Mariko Tamaki on frequently challenged ‘This One Summer’

As their award-winning book continues to face censorship, they note that, “A book doesn’t stop existing by taking it off the shelf. Nor do the ideas contained within.”

Mariko and Jillian Tamaki, whose This One Summer, landed at the top of the American Library Association’s list of 2016’s most challenged books, issued a statement about the book’s frequent challenges:

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