Drink and Draw
Our next Drink and Draw, at Good Sons on Beaver, will be Thursday, June 13th at 8:00pm.
We have been adding an “ingredient” to the event and then drawing and talking about that element at the Drink and Draw. Most of the time, Carter is the one who gives adds the ingredient and this time is no different. This is what Carter sent me, “in “honor” of the new Man of Steel movie, what else can they screw up with the Superman mythos? Ma and Pa Kent are now alpaca ranchers in Colorado. Lex Luthor is now a streetwise hood. Supergirl is now Superman’s mom.” Oh, yeah!!
Paul Jenkins on Mainstream Comics
I have a great deal of respect for Paul Jenkins. The guy has written some great comics over the last decade plus of his time in the industry. Last week he signed an exclusive deal to work with Boom Studios. This is a sign of times changing for sure. When the independent companies start making a legitimate play for top talent (AND pay them properly for their work) the ever shifting landscape my forever have changed.
This week also had Jenkins speaking about HIS experiences at Marvel and especially his time working at DC and dealing with editorial there. It is well worth the read. Jenkins lays in to both pretty heavy.
(exasperated sigh) DC in September
Several people mentioned the early trickles of information being released about DC’s September previews (we still have over two weeks before June’s previews are put to bed… but I digress.) The early info being released says they will all be connected to a large scale villain oriented company wide crossover called Forever Evil. That, in and of itself, doesn’t sound so bad. It is when you keep reading that it gets much worse.
Each comic will have a 3D cover and each comic will be priced at $3.99. There will be 52 issues that will run “in place of” SOME of the titles currently being released and will be designated point one, two, three and four. There will also be a separate seven issue mini-series with some kind of story about villains doing villainous stuff.
So, the problem is with the point books. See, some of the characters (and books) are getting four books in place of the regular one issue. For example, Batman, Batman and Robin, Detective and Dark Knight will ALL get four issues each! Batman is usually a $3.99 book, but the others are only (HA!! Only) $2.99. Each of these books will have FOUR titles published in September and each named with a different villain and priced at $3.99. So, Detective Comics #23.1 will be (and I don’t know which villain it will be) The Riddler, issue 23.2 will be Man Bat and so on, but the real kicker is the price.
A normal $2.99 a month purchase of a single copy of Batman and Robin – maybe because you like Pat Gleason’s art, because who doesn’t, and want to read a Bat book – would now cost you… $16!!!
Throw on top of this it being September, the worst month of the year for sales of any comic shop, this is a very scary prospect for retailers.
Kyle and I have only just briefly discussed it and are unsure how we will stock this… event. There are going to be a lot of people who will not want an additional cost of $13 per book they read per that month. I have not talked to DC yet as to any opportunities or incentives for this… event. But there will probably be some kind of sign up or something like that. We will let you know in a couple weeks.
Personally – I’m numb to the whole thing. Just another dumb idea brought to us by the brain surgeons at DC, but doesn’t this sound like a terrible idea from the era of 1990’s Marvel? Well, remember that Bob Harras was the editor and chief of pre-bankrupt Marvel Comics in the late nineties. Hmmm, makes more sense now doesn’t it. Anyone remember hologram X-comics? Urgh, I do.