Spider-Man

Comics Events in LA: Week of 1/2/11

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:

Tuesday, January 4, 11:30 AM: Stan Lee (co-creator of Spider-Man, Fantastic Four, et al.) will be honored with the 2,428th Star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame (in the category of Motion Pictures) at 7072 Hollywood Blvd., Los Angeles 90028 (in front of the Live Nation Building). Guest speakers: Gill Champion (President/COO, Pow! Entertainment) and Todd McFarlane (Spawn). Tickets: $0.

Wednesday, January 5: NEW COMICS DAY! Find your local comics specialty shop.

Wednesday, January 5, 8 PM: Comics podcast Bagged & Boarded with SModcastle’s Matt Cohen and Brendan Creecy with special guest TBA has a live show broadcast at SModcastle, 6468 Santa Monica Blvd., Los Angeles 90038. Tickets: $10.

Wednesday, January 5, 8:30 PM: The Meltdown (weekly comedy show) with stand-up comedians Barry Rothbart, Brett Gelman, Jackie Kashian, Brendon Walsh, and Maria Bamford, at Meltdown Comics, 7522 Sunset Blvd., Los Angeles 90046. Tickets: $8.

Saturday, January 8, 8 PM: Battle for the Planet of the Geeks, calling itself “the dorkiest trivia war ever waged”, is being held at SModcastle, 6468 Santa Monica Blvd., Los Angeles 90038. Tickets: $10 or $40 for 4-person team.

The future: (more…)

So you want to read Spider-Man comics

We’re in the thick of the holiday season. Shopping is probably inevitable for a lot of us. If you or someone you know thinks Spider-Man is pretty cool but is clueless as to what to read first, I’ve put together a great big list as a checklist or reading order guide.

Marvel Comics has been publishing The Amazing Spider-Man since 1963, so being a little overwhelmed about what to get is understandable. Peter Parker (right) is pretty confused by it all too. And he’s lived through it.

So, here’s my Reader’s Guide to Amazing Spider-Man with every graphic novel that’s been published from that comic book series, what’s inside, and in what order you should read it. I’ve also included cover prices and if there are alternate ways to get the stories (soft cover, hard cover, etc.). After the list, I’ve also included a recommended reading list if you’re only interested in the most universally loved material instead of everything. Please feel free to join in the conversation if you have any favorites, questions, corrections or suggestions.

Just a note for those of you Spidey-savvy enough: this list only focuses on the Amazing Spider-Man comics series from 1963 to present, and for the most part does not include spin-offs like Web of Spider-Man or the relaunch series like Ultimate Spider-Man or Marvel Adventures Spider-Man (both of which are great ways to read Spider-Man too but they exist in their own universe apart from Amazing Spider-Man, and as such, they’re pretty streamlined, self-contained and easier to figure out where to start – although if you’re not sure, post a comment or email and I’ll be glad to help out).

I’ve also got similar Reader’s Guides to Uncanny X-Men and Fantastic Four. And I’ll be posting more here as time allows. Any requests for comic book series to cover?

Jack Kirby and Steve Ditko Omnibuseses on the way

Once again trolling Amazon, I’ve discovered a pair of listings for heavy duty hardcover omnibus collections of work from two seminal comic book artists and creators, Jack Kirby and Steve Ditko. Most of the material hasn’t been available since it was originally published 30-50 years ago, but next Summer we’ll have it again.

Between the two of them, Kirby and Ditko co-created (in some cases, it’s been argued they solely created) and established the core Marvel Comics universe with Spider-Man, Iron Man, the Hulk, Fantastic Four, Thor, Captain America, Dr. Strange, the Silver Surfer, the original X-Men, and many, many more.

Wait, keep your seat. This isn’t that stuff.

You see, both Kirby and Ditko worked at one time or another for Marvel’s primary competitor, DC Comics, on lesser known comics. This is that stuff.

But despite being lesser known, it’s still worth some excitement. So maybe just attentively lean forward in your seat.

You see, before Jack Kirby returned to Marvel Comics to help create the Fantastic Four, he created what many believe to be the proto-Fantastic Four, a quartet of adventuring explorers called the Challengers of the Unknown. He also worked on a Green Arrow strip, which appears to make up the bulk of The Jack Kirby Omnibus Vol. 1, according to the current product description:

In 1957, following the dissolution of his partnership with Joe Simon, Jack Kirby returned to DC Comics. Among his new assignments was the Green Arrow feature that ran simultaneously in ADVENTURE COMICS and WORLD’S FINEST COMICS, pitting the Emerald Archer and his sidekick, Speedy, against a plethora of foes.

For Steve Ditko, he left Marvel Comics in the late 1960s after an insurmountable run on The Amazing Spider-Man and trippy Dr. Strange stories, and headed to rival publisher DC Comics where he created characters like the Creeper and the duo Hawk & Dove. The Steve Ditko Omnibus Vol. 1 listing is scant on details but judging from the cover image above, the book looks to consist of his 8-issue series Shade, the Changing Man from 1977. The character and concepts were significantly revamped for an acclaimed series of the same name by Peter Milligan and Chris Bachalo in 1990, as part of the newly created Vertigo imprint, along side Neil Gaiman’s Sandman and Grant Morrison’s Animal Man.

Now you may be wondering to yourself, “What in the world is an omnibus?” And it’s an excellent question. In this instance, it’s not a type of vehicle for transporting a large number of people. Apparently it’s also a publishing term for an anthology or collection of multiple works. The comics world picked it up a few years ago. I think maybe Marvel was the first to use it for an ultra-huge hardcover collection of work that’s usually on the pricy side. It’s like a normal graphic novel on steroids. Now you know!

Mark Millar’s Trouble: Pedophilia the Marvel Way

Some geek scouring of Amazon revealed a listing for a hardcover collection of the 2003 Marvel Comics mini-series Trouble by Mark Millar and Terry Dodson scheduled for release on June 8, 2011. Yup, that’s the cover of the first issue from 2003. Classy, no?

Mark Millar has made a significant name for himself, most notably to the public at large for being the creative mind behind the Hollywood movies Kick-Ass and Wanted, both based on comic book mini-series he wrote (the former with artist John Romita, Jr., and the latter with J. G. Jones). (Terry Dodson is also a pretty popular comics artist, having worked on characters like Spider-Man, Wonder Woman and the X-Men.) So it makes sense for Marvel to mine its back catalog for material with Millar’s name on it. But I have to admit I never thought this comic would ever see the light of day again.

The concept is that Spider-Man’s Aunt May and Uncle Ben, while teenagers and not yet married, go on a double date with Spider-Man’s future parents to a resort in the Hamptons for summer vacation. It’s never explicitly stated that’s who they are (no last names are ever given), but the intent is pretty obvious. The story soon turns into a very special episode dealing with teen pregnancy.

As if that wasn’t blasphemous enough for longtime Spider-Man fans, Marvel inexplicably decided that instead of comics art on the covers, each of the five issues should use uncomfortable pictures of young girls in bathing suits, like the one creeping you out right now. The idea was to have French photographer Phillipe Biabolos mimic the covers of romance novels in an effort to draw in female readers. Idea and execution don’t always stay on the same path.

You see, this comic was supposed to help resurrect the long stagnant romance genre in comics, which was huge in the late 1940s and early 1950s, bringing in tons of female readers. But in 1954 the comics industry felt pressured to create a self-censorship board following some heated Senate hearings on the dangers of comics to America’s youth. So romance comics became boring and people stopped reading. By the 1970s the genre was dead. Flash forward to 2003, and Marvel Comics realizes that drawing from a demographic consisting of just over half the population could be a pretty good strategy. So they decided to give romance comics a go again. And then proceeded to royally botch it up with creepy covers of possibly under-age girls and an unnecessary connection to Marvel’s superhero mascot.

The series, conceived and written entirely by men who work almost exclusively in the superhero genre, failed to find an audience in comics shops. Many of those stores had very likely never tried to sell a romance comic before. And let’s be honest, they had an uphill battle. I have a hard time imagining someone who would be interested in romance comics feeling comfortable buying something with that cover. It’s got Pedobear written all over it.

As you might expect, it was lambasted by readers and drew a lot of critical ire at the time. In fact, it faired so poorly that the softcover collection of the individual issues, which would have been distributed to bookstores so female readers might actually discover it, was cancelled. Who knows? Maybe book stores took one look at it and refused to carry it. Regardless, the aborted graphic novel seemed to be an unspoken message of “Forget it. It never happened.”

And yet, here it comes again. Has it aged well? I guess we’ll find out. I’d love to hear Mark Millar or Terry Dodson’s thoughts on the comic now with some time passed. Marvel Comics Editor-in-Chief Joe Quesada and former Marvel publisher Bill Jemas were also heavily involved in the concept and design of the comic, so I’m curious about their thoughts as well. Any regrets? Any realizations that maybe this could’ve been pulled off better? Or did everyone just overreact and misread everything?

(It should be noted that sometimes these super-advanced Amazon listings end up being completely wrong. So it’s entirely possible this never comes out. But it’s a good excuse to revisit this failed attempt at reaching female readers. Quite a few major comics publishers have plenty of examples. And sometimes they even get it right.)

Uh oh. My marriage might be official again.

Over two years ago (!), Marvel Comics had a goofy story in Amazing Spider-Man where a devil-like demon called Mephisto basically erased Peter Parker’s marriage to Mary Jane Watson. They had been married for 20 years and just like that it was gone. Comic geeks across the world were outraged.

Not to be left out of the indignation, in an act of fever-induced inspiration I announced the erasing of my own marriage in protest. Both Spider-Man and I have been web-swinging bachelors ever since. (Yes, I can make webs. What of it?)

Well it looks like the gig might soon be up. Marvel Comics released a publicity image for a Spider-Man story to take place some time this year, and it looks like the marriage might live again. If so, I guess I’ll have to get “re-married”. Bummer. And I was having so much fun with my communicable diseases.

See, this is what’s great about superhero comics. If something stupid happens, just wait a year or so and it’ll be undone. Character arcs are for chumps.

(Click here to look at the enbiggified version at Comic Book Resources)

(Wait a minute, is that a baby in the background? Oh yeah that’s right. In the ’90s, Peter and Mary Jane had a baby who mysteriously vanished in some weird plane hijacking incident. Both parents got over it real quick because Marvel figured superhero fans might get bummed out reading about mourning parents for a few years.)

Comic Shop Experience

The Australian band Tripod has tapped into a universal experience so eloquently that it must be shared.

(Thanks to Richard Starkings for sending this to me.)

If Spider-Man is no longer married…

Late last year Marvel Comics released a storyline in their flagship Amazing Spider-Man comic book series that clumsily erased Peter Parker’s 1987 marriage to Mary Jane Watson. All sorts of geek outrage ensued at the time. I guess it sort of still rages. The whole thing was rather silly but hey, them’s comics. But sometimes you don’t really care enough until it effects you personally.

Last week, while lying in bed wishing I was dead from a pretty tough cold, I noticed two red boxes on top of our bedroom bookcase. I had almost forgotten about them. And then it all came falling into place in typical comic book melodrama.

The two red boxes each held one doll (or “action figure” if you prefer) of Spider-Man and Mary Jane from their comic book wedding originally depicted in The Amazing Spider-Man Annual #21. The dolls were gifts. The occasion for the gifts? My wedding.

And now… looking at the dolls… and knowing that their wedding never really happened… it feels like my own wedding didn’t happen. November 10, 2006 was the happiest day of my life. But now… it just feels like an empty lie.

And that’s why, as of now, I’m single again. That’s right, if Spider-Man is no longer married, then neither am I.

I know this is probably an awkward way for everyone, including my wife – er, my girlfriend – to find out, but I thought it was the best way to get the word out, especially considering the late notice. Technically, this will be retroactively in effect since December 28, 2007, when the offending issue was originally released.

I hope all of the people at Marvel Comics will think long and hard about the next relationship they destroy.

I’d like to thank my flu for helping me see the light before it was too late.