You don’t have to sit at home alone reading to get into comic books and graphic novels. There are always great events going on that celebrate the vitality and creativity of comics. Just here in Los Angeles, there are more events I can ever make. But I try, and so should you. You never know what you’ll discover.
Here are some local Los Angeles events coming up that celebrate the sequential art form.
Wednesday, November 17, 8:30 PM: The Meltdown (weekly comedy show) with stand-up comics David Koechner, Jen Kirkman, Nick Thune, TJ Miller, with videos by Kumail Nanjiani and Jonah Ray, at Meltdown Comics, 7522 Sunset Blvd., Los Angeles 90046. Tickets: $8.
Wednesday, November 17, 9 PM: Top Cow Productions’ publisher Filip Sablik, president Matt Hawkins and writer Jeff Katz are guests for this week’s live podcast of Bagged & Boarded with Matt Cohen, at SModcastle, 6468 Santa Monica Blvd., Los Angeles 90038. Tickets: $10.
A week of anniversaries comes to a close. In reverse order:
Thursday, November 11: 13 years ago, Nahleen took the train in from Fitchburg to visit me in Boston. While at the frigid City Hall Plaza, we agreed that maybe we LIKE liked each other and should, like, totally go out. Somehow time passed and now we agree that maybe we LOVE love each other.
Wednesday, November 10: Four years ago, my friend Yvis very audibly mistook my wedding ceremony for his surprise birthday party. In front of everyone. It was awkward. And hilarious. (OK, it was planned.)
Tuesday, November 9: 11 years ago, Nahleen and I left New England for Los Angeles! Our journey continues…
I say it a lot because it’s true. Comics can be anything. Public perception of comic books has significantly improved just in the last 10 years, but for the Average Joe & Jane, comics are still just superheroes and/or funny animals – kids stuff.
Well sure, they can be that. But superheroes and funny animals are two genres, like romantic comedy and political thriller are to books and movies. Comic books as a form can be about anything. And there are hundreds of examples out there to support this argument. (Comics can be romantic comedies and political thrillers, too.)
Here’s the latest example that has me excited: A comic book cookbook! Or a graphic novel cookbook. Or as the artist calls it, a cartoon cookbook. That last one has the best ring to it but isn’t entirely accurate. (I’m sure I’ll get around to my post about comic books vs. cartoons vs caricatures vs illustrated books at some point).
However you describe it, it may be the first of it’s kind. (There is a popular manga genre about food but I don’t think any of those are actual manga cookbooks. Let me know in the comments section, if I’m wrong.)
The Dirt Candy Cookbook (working title) written by chef and New York City-based Dirt Candy restaurant owner Amanda Cohen and drawn by Ryan Dunlavey is scheduled for a Summer 2012 release from Random House/Clarkson Potter.
Dunlavey has a knack for these kinds of projects where he injects a fun appealing energy to information, so I’m thrilled to see him get this kind of gig. He’s probably best known for Action Philosophers with writer Fred Van Lente, where the two ripped through the lives and schools of thought of some of the world’s most brilliant minds. The two also teamed up for a similarly frenetic yet informed look at the history of comic books with Comic Book Comics. What? Comics can be used to teach us about history and philosophy?
Since my dismissive comment about motion comics, I’ve received tons and tons of hate mail. OK, perhaps I exaggerate. Perhaps I made that up completely. In reality, not one person living or dead made a single comment about it. So either everybody was so enraged, they couldn’t focus enough to write a response, or everybody silently agreed. Or more likely, most people have never even heard of motion comics, never mind knowing enough to form an opinion.
If you are in that last group, you’ll be able to catch up pretty quickly because motion comics are still in their infancy. Put simply, motion comics are adaptations of comic books and graphic novels that use computers to animate the original comic artwork (or recreations), and then replaces the written word with voice actors, music and sound effects. Put way simply, it’s a mini-cartoon based on a comic.
While stylistically more slick, they are basically the old Marvel Comics cartoons from the ’60s.
But they’re not without their fans. The appeal and idea of motion comics is that it brings to life your favorite comics. It’s typically very faithful in look and story because they’re pulling straight from the original comics.
The downside is that the animation is really limited because they’re trying to animate static images that were only ever meant to represent movement, not actually depict movement.
My main problem with them is that they really aren’t comics at all. The comic book industry and art form has been stuck with inaccurate terms for decades upon decades. Comic books aren’t necessarily comical; they more resemble magazines than actual books. Graphic novels aren’t necessarily graphic in content but do use graphic design and imagery; they don’t have be a long narrative like novels. So I suppose adding one more misnomer to the pile shouldn’t matter.
But it’s worth noting: motion comics are not comic books. They do not use the language of comics. They use the language of motion pictures (film, animation, etc.).
This past weekend at King Con in Brooklyn, Act-I-Vate founder and writer/artist Dean Haspiel debuted his attempt at a motion comic with Billy Dogma in “Sex Planet” [warning: adult content, so I won’t embed it here]. His goal seemed to be to include more of the language of comics while pulling back some on the animation. That’s a direction that interests me more than the above example but the finished product is mixed. The voice acting is lacking (Haspiel himself provides the voice of Billy Dogma) and there’s a weird timing issue with having finished read the text and waiting for the actors to catch up, but there are some cute visual gags that have well-timed reveals. See The Beat for more on this.
Clearly motion comics are just getting started. So, “To Be Continued…”
This Saturday night is the Magic Meathands‘ popular Family Friendly Night, and I’ll be there performing with my fellow hands of meat. Opening for us will be Jump Start, an improv group based in Redondo Beach.
$7 gets you in for the whole night! Only $3 if you’re 12 or under!
I acted in this and I also edited it. Wendy Lee did the fancy hand-held camera work.
Also featuring Mary Benedict (writer/director), Nikki Turner and Travis McElroy, also of the Magic Meathands.
This was a lot of fun to be in. My mission: yell and be angry. Bonus points if you can name all of the real games Mary used to create the fictional Calcatron. (I love that name. Sounds like Megatron’s forgotten step-brother.)
Oh and if I ever invite you to game night, I promise it’s not like this. No, really, it’s not!
A: Is this one of those trick genies where your wish backfires because you weren’t incredibly specific enough? Pretending for a moment it’s not, I would probably be pretty standard in the wish department:
1. Greater empathy and understanding among humans (world peace, etc.).
2. A bottomless bin of money (like Scrooge McDuck).
3. A tail. Yes, an actual tail like a cat’s tail. I have no idea why but they fascinate me and seem like fun. But now I sound like a furry, so maybe that’s a bad idea. Plus it would probably get in the way a lot and all of my pants would have to be modified. Maybe a detachable tail. But it has to actually move around and stuff. Pinning to my butt a long string that does nothing wouldn’t cut it.
You don’t have to sit at home alone reading to get into comic books and graphic novels. There are always great events going on that celebrate the vitality and creativity of comics. Just here in Los Angeles, there are more events I can ever make. But I try, and so should you. You never know what you’ll discover.
Here are some local Los Angeles events coming up that celebrate the sequential art form.
This week:
Sunday, November 7, 3 PM: Stan Lee (co-creator/writer of Spider-Man, Iron Man, Thor, Fantastic Four) signs Marvel ArtWorks products at Every Picture Tells A Story Gallery, 1333 Montana Ave., Santa Monica 90403. Tickets: $0 (but Stan Lee is only signing Marvel ArtWorks products, so purchase may be necessary).
Sunday, November 7, 5 PM: Stan Lee introduces the documentary With Great Power: The Stan Lee Story followed by a discussion with filmmakers Terry Dougas, Nikki Frakes and Will Hess, at the Aero Theater, 1328 Montana Ave., Santa Monica 90403 (across the street from the Every Picture Gallery event). Tickets: $11.
Wednesaday, November 10, 7 PM: Jim McCann (writer, New Avengers, ABC-TV’s One Life to Live) signs his new release Return of the Dapper Men at Meltdown Comics, 7522 Sunset Blvd., Los Angeles 90046.
A little actor/improviser shop talk for you, in preparation for tonight’s show.
Reminder to self: Thinking of funnier/cleverer/betterer things I should’ve said on the drive home from a show or shoot is a waste of time.
This is fairly common among performers. I’ve done it plenty of times. I hear others talking about doing it themselves. It can feel like constructive analysis, and to a point it might be helpful for the future. But it’s very easy to get carried away and the truth of it is that it comes from a place of insecurity. Because this only happens when I feel like I wasn’t good enough.
Let me be clear, I’m not advocating blind self-congratulations devoid of the reality of how a show or shoot actually went. It’s important and helpful to look at choices made and see how they effected performances.
But when a funnier line pops into your head on the drive home, and your mind plays over and over how you should’ve said that line instead of what you actually said, that doesn’t really serve any purpose beyond heading to crazy town. For improvisation, when every show is completely different and the odds of the exact same situation presenting itself again is incredibly small, it’s basically a useless activity.
For example: OK, the next time I’m playing Hannibal Lecter who has to babysit a monkey’s carrot garden, when the baby carrots scream for more ice cream, I will say “I’ll make carrot cake out of you!” because it references that earlier scene about the carrot cake maker. Huh? That scene is never ever going to happen again! Why am I wasting my time dissecting it line by line? Unless I’m going to adapt it into something scripted like a sketch or short film, re-writing or punching up dialogue to something so temporary doesn’t help me become a stronger performer.
So how to shut off the loop in my head? Instead I focus on slightly broader questions. Was I listening? Was I open to the first opportunity to explore something potentially funny or interesting? Did I make strong choices? How were my characters? When did the laughs happen? Was I able to heighten or at least repeat what I was doing when laughs happened? This line of thinking is much more constructive as long as I answer honestly for myself.
If that doesn’t work, turn on the radio real loud and sing along even louder as a weird character with a strange but very specific voice – but make sure you get the words exactly right. Maybe you’ll find a new character you can use, and it breaks you out of that cyclical thinking. And maybe you’ll make the person in the next car laugh.
Let me know if you have any tricks for this. I’d love to hear them.
My post on Monday about innovative experiments with digital comics doesn’t mean I don’t love me some dead tree comics. Print still has a lot to offer but digital means that the physical version has to step it up and offer more. Fortunately there are some good examples out there.
As a counter-point to the Johnny Cash digital graphic novel with soundtrack, there is BB Wolf and the Three L.P.’s by JD Arnold and Richard Koslowski from Top Shelf Productions. It can be purchased with a 7-song CD, BB Wolf and the Howlers: The Lost Recordings. The graphic novel spins 1920s race tension with the Three Little Pigs fairy tale. The CD brings the music of the titular blues singing main character to life, which is a very cool way to eliminate the guess work of what the music of a fictional character from a silent medium sounds like. You can also get the limited edition BB Wolf Box Set, which includes the graphic novel, the CD and a wooden box with laser engraved art on the cover and 2 shot glasses for that authentic hard-drinking blues effect.
Creating such an experience that goes beyond the pages is a compelling way to make it still matter to have print and physical product. But it doesn’t have to be about creating ancillary material. Savvy creators and publishers can find ways to have their published material be an aesthetic extension of the world they have created.
Fantagraphics Books has always excelled at this. C. Tyler‘s You’ll Never Know, both Book I: A Good and Decent Man and the new release Book II: Collateral Damage, are designed to look like scrap books or photo albums, inside and out. A visually powerful choice that is incredibly appropriate since the story centers on a woman trying to piece together her reticent father’s wartime past.
Last year, DC Comics published Wednesday Comics, an anthology of superhero and adventure stories printed on large broadsheet newsprint that folded out to 14″ x 20″ pages, approximately double the size of modern comic book pages. Reminiscent of the old Sunday comics pages from the first half of the 1900’s, it was a kick to see Green Lantern, Batman, Wonder Woman and other characters in this retro format that pre-dated nearly all of them.
There are a lot of other good examples. Some publishers, like Archaia Entertainment and Drawn & Quarterly, just have consistently great design sense in their print publications. Tumor, by Joshua Hale Fialkov and Noel Tuazon, started its life as a digital graphic novel on the Amazon Kindle, but has ended up being a great looking physical product. Chris Ware’s Acme Novelty Library books (and really any of his books) are always intricately stunning.
So sure, digital comics are the future. But that doesn’t automatically mean print comics have to be relegated to the past. There are still new and creative ways to make an appealing print comic book or graphic novel. As the ratio of print to digital finds its level ground, it will be up to creators and publishers to make products in both realms that are compelling and worth a reader’s investment.
I say it a lot because it’s true. Comics can be anything. Public perception of comic books has significantly improved just in the last 10 years, but for the Average Joe & Jane, comics are still just superheroes and/or funny animals – kids stuff.
Corey Blake 