The official comments about the issue are: “Alex Ross joins Geoff Johns as co-writer for Part 1 of "Thy Kingdom Come," the epic story years in the making, springing from KINGDOM COME! Not a hoax! Not a dream! Not an imaginary story! Welcome the newest member to the Justice Society of America: the Kingdom Come Superman!
Coming from an Earth plagued by heroes-gone-extreme, how will this Superman react to an incarnation of the Justice Society he never knew? This Superman’s world needed better heroes.
So does ours.”

Here is hoping that the story/series is as riveting as the cover!

Looks like DC is really starting to nail some fab changes. The latest “Sinestro Corps” has got an exceedingly high degree of praise this past week for its story and art. This cover for a forthcoming issue of Wizard (painted by Alex Ross) hints at further changes in the not-so-distant future.

This great little cartoon from www.phdcomics.com captures in a snapshot the contribution that this humble man made to human history. And I do mean that seriously.

The following info is quoted from here.

“He was born in Taiwan in 1910, when the island was under Japanese colonial rule. He moved to Japan in 1933, according to Japan’s daily Mainichi newspaper. Faced with food shortages in post World War II Japan, Ando developed the idea that a quality, convenient noodle product would help feed the masses. He founded Nissin in 1948. In 1958, “Chicken Ramen,” the first instant noodle product, was introduced after many trials. Following its success, the company continued to add innovative products, including “Cup Noodle” in 1971.“

Well one can well argue about the nutitional value of most of the instant noodles in North American supermarkets… but anyone who puts some affordable food in a human belly to keep them alive a day longer deserves a measure of honor when they cease to live anymore.

Thank you, Momofuku-San.

In February’s PLAYBOY issue, hitting newsstands this week, US Air Force staff sergeant Michelle Manhart is photographed in her uniform yelling and holding weapons under the headline “Tough Love.” She also poses in the buff with only dogtags on.

Well, it certainly brings a new sense to “be all that you can be” doesn’t it?

Did I mention that she is married and has two kids. Well, the exclusive interview with her on Fox News today has her say that this fulfills a “life long dream”.

The Air Force has decided to suspend her pending investigation. Yah don’t say, eh? Though I must say that she looks stunning for 30 years old.

I just returned from the Paradise Comics Toronto ComiCon. For more about my experiences there and a recap of the DC Nation panel, click on the Extended Entry.

The con was held in the National Trade Centre on the grounds of the Canadian National Exposition. Toronto is one of my favorite places, and if you know anything about the city, you’ll know that there might not be a better place there for this convention. There seemed to be lots of room and lots of parking on this beautiful sunny day. The only drawback that I could see for the location was that there was a lot of backed up traffic because of some construction on the nearby Gardiner Expressway, but that’s not the fault of the convention hosts.

I made the 2 1/2 hour trip up from my house in Buffalo, NY, with my wife and we gladly paid the $18.00 (Canadian) each for a one day admission, but we went with only a few ideas about what to expect. This trip was really my first time attending a major comics convention. I decided not to concentrate on shopping, but to try to get to meet some of the comic creators that were there and to attend the DC Nation presentation. I was not dissappointed.

I’ll admit I get very nervous talking to people in stiuations like this, but thanks to my wife, we got some big name creators to autograph the books I brought with us. They were all very gracious as they were signing and they did seem like nice people. Brian Azzarello looked mockingly dissappointed when we only had one book for him to sign. “I only sign multiples,” he joked as he threw up his hands. Both Gail Simone and Dale Eaglesham signed my copy of “Villains United,” and I got to compliment her on the chilling way that she has used Dr. Psycho recently. Greg Rucka inscribed the message “Scott- Hit Like a GIRL!” above the picture of Wonder Woman belting Superman on my copy of Wonder Woman #219. Frank Cho impressed my wife by drawing a pitcure of Oscar the weiner dog on my Liberty Meadows. He told us about how Oscar was based on his real life dachshund named Truman, and seemed genuinely interested in when my wife told him about our dachshunds. Finally, the legendary George Perez (pictured below) was very pleasant as he signed my books at the ACTOR booth. There were lots of other creators there, but I was worn out from the nervous adrenaline that had been racing through me after getting up the nerve to talk already.

DC Nation

Dan DiDio, DC’s Senior VP- Executive Editor, hosted a panel discussion called DC Nation. The panel (as pictured below, from left to right) consisted of DiDio, Jimmy Palmiotti (writer and artist- Jonah Hex, The Battle for Bluedhaven), Gail Simone (writer- Birds of Prey and Villains United), Jan Jones (Editorial Coordinator and one of the editors on 52), and Greg Rucka (writer- 52, Wonder Woman, OMAC Project, Gotham Central).

DiDio was a natural host for the panel and has quite a gregarious personality. He and Rucka kept the panel very entertaining and joked quite a bit at the expense of themselves, each other, and the convention attendees. (By the way, conventions are not only a great way to be able to put a creator’s face with a name that you have been reading, but also to find out how that name is pronounced. Dan DiDio said his name as “di-DEE-yo”, and Greg Rucka sounds like “ruck-a”, not like “roo-ka.”)

The panel lasted for a full hour and a half. It began with about 45 minutes on the almost concluded Crisis story. (Infinite Crisis #7, the last chapter, is due out this coming week. 52 is to begin next week.) During the first portion, DiDio and the panelists tried to answer many questions and concerns that attendees asked them about Infinite Crisis.

DiDio emphasized that the purpose for Infinite Crisis (besides making money) was that they wanted to pay tribute to everything that came before, but that it was then to be put to rest. There will be no new Earth-2. The “New Earth” at the end of Infinite Crisis #6 should be the best one possible and be the most able to be built upon. They want to tap into as much of the rich history at DC as possible.

A lot of the time in the panel was spent addressing the idea of “continuity.” Rucka joked that, “If someone wants me to write a story beholden to continuity from sixty years ago, they need to get a new hobby.” He emphasized that the story shouldn’t serve continuity, but rather continuity should serve the story. But after saying that, he stressed that they tried not to change continuity without a good reason. Palmiotti offered his coming Freedom Fighters series as an example. It contains new characters, but has strong ties to what came before it in the DC Universe. It acknowledges the past but tells new stories.

Rucka said that much of Infinite Crisis, including the Sacrifice story line where Wonder Woman killed Max Lord, had been “worked out three and a half years ago.” They always knew Diana was going to kill somebody, but the situation needed to be complicated enough to make it believable. She was the one character of the big three who would do it and would stand up after and say that she believed in her action. Superman and Batman couldn’t.

Jan Jones was introduced as the person who is trying to keep all of the characters in the DC Universe straight. She has compiled a master list that includes every possible character and has assigned each character to a different editor. If a creator wants to use a character, they have to check with the editor in charge of that character to find out details about their current status and portrayal. DiDio cited a recent month when Metamorpho appeared in three different titles and another when Black Lightening appeared in four. In both cases, the appearance and portrayal of those characters was drastically different each time. Jones’s efforts are an attempt to create consistency among the characters.

The panelists were very proud of the forgotten characters that they have been able to give a new life. Gail Simone was quick to list Catman as her favorite, and Palmotti mentioned the Freedom Fighters. DiDio related the story of when he suggested using Detective Chimp in a phone conversation and writer Bill Willingham is supposed to have said, “If I was in the room right now I’d be kissing you on the lips.”

All of the panelists seemed to welcome the question of how they are keeping the characters human with the scale of things that are going on. DiDio pointed to the church scene in Infinite Crisis and told how that was put into the story for “a moment of reflection.” The characters were human and were overwhelmed by the circumstances. The characters needed that moment. Rucka said, “You can write anything as long as it is honest,” while Simone added that a writer has to give a reader something to grab onto. She compared the best stories to a roller coaster that take you everywhere emotionally.

After closing the first half of the time, DiDio declared that it was time to move on from Crisis. He reiterated that the idea behind DC Nation was that he wanted to create a sense of community. He took some polls in the room by show of hands and asked people to share what it was that they liked now about reading comics and what they were reacting to.

In a randomly silly moment, DiDio revealed that Scooby Doo #100 included an OMAC crossover. Most of the rest of the panel looked surprised and disbelieving, including Rucka, but DiDio claimed it was true. The people working on the book wanted a painted cover to mark their 100th issue and told him that they would do “anything” to get one. He told them to put an OMAC in it. They couldn’t do that exactly, but he told them he would be happy if it was just something that was close enough that he would know it was an OMAC. As a result, the book included a character called the Centurian who has a Mohawk haircut and who is there to represent the OMACs symbolically.

When asked if the upcoming 52 series would actually be on time every week, the answer was “AB-SO-LUTE-LY.” Several of the panelists said that the only thing that would make one of the issues late was an act of God. If there is a snowstorm in Pennsylvania, for example, that is out of DC’s hands. Otherwise, they promised that nothing at DC would make an issue late.

Rucka tried to describe the enormous amount of work and coordination that is going into 52. He described the complicated process that he the other writers- Geoff Johns, Grant Morrison, Mark Waid and Keith Giffen- are going through. They are working on Week 24 right now. He said the work is “balls to the wall crazy” and “the closest thing to a real job that we’ve had in comics.” However he also said that “The commitment is like nothing I’ve ever seen. There is no ego involved. Everything is for what is best for the story.”

Rucka said “Every character in the DC Universe will appear in 52. ..There is so much cool stuff [in 52] and the worst thing is that we can’t say anything.” Rucka slyly offered one “spoiler” from 52 that is actually more of a teaser. He said that on May 10, in Week 1, on the first two pages, the ending of 52 is already built in. “It’s all there,” he said. He invited people to look back around week 45 and said you’ll be able to see how it has been building from what is present on those first two pages.

The panel closed with a “lighting round” when the panelists would only answer questions with one word and then would ask a question back to the attendee. Everyone in attendance then received a complementary pin and DiDio declared that they were now officially members of the DC Nation.

In Conclusion

There were lots of other things going on at the con that I only got a glimpse of. There were several panels on this year’s convention theme- Women in Comics. The Shuster awards honored Canadian comic creators. An exclusive video conference with Stan Lee that had been recorded earlier was playing somewhere. I did see the last half of the Degrassi panel where cast members from the TV show Degrassi: The Next Generation and creators of upcoming graphic novels, Degrassi: Extra Credit answered questions. (They said Kevin Smith was “just a guy” who was easy to hang out and play cards with.)

I don’t know how attendance at this con compares to the organizer’s expectations, but I can say that it never felt too crowded. I also can’t compare it to other cons in terms of what was or wasn’t there since this was my first, but I can say that my wife and I both had a very enjoyable time. There was no shortage of things to do or see. We certainly felt it was worth our time and money and would plan to go again.

By the way, I want to publicly thank my wife for coming along with me to this event, even though she has no interest in comics herself. She was great and did absolutely everything I wanted to do (except for taking that picture of me with the girl in the great looking Power Girl costume, but I guess I can understand that).

This film makes me worry. Sure, I’ve been a Civil War Re-enactor since 1988, but I have cut back. Yes, I collect comic books now, but that doesn’t make me look like this does it??

Well, okay, I understand where “Thor” is coming from. I know people like him, anyway. And “Kang,” well, he hit it on the head. “Reed Richards” is also spot on.

But the ending… it doesn’t happen as often as you might think. We plan these things too far in advance. … I mean THEY! THEY plan these things too far in advance.

(EDITOR’S NOTES: Don’t click on extended entry until viewing the video. Also, I embedded it for you, Cplotter. — MICHAEL)

I’m just glad that they didn’t make fun of social studies teachers too. That would be just too much for my fragile ego to take.

Back to reality, I laughed so hard when “Supergirl” spoke. That made the whole thing classic.

I think I scared my wife when I tried to figure out if Reed Richard’s arm was made of a “pool noodle.”

OK, so I might not be able to post the most, but I’m not above sucking up a bit, eh?

More of that preview and others from DC may be seen here, at Comics Continuum.

Lauren Shuler Donner, producer of all three X-Men movies, says she would like to develop the Metal Men as a movie. In an interview at SuperHeroHype.com, she explained that the DC Comic is quite different from X-Men. She said it would be, “much more like ‘Men in Black’. It’s miles away from ‘X-Men’. It’s lighter and it’s fun. A lot of CGI. That would be fun for me to try…”

The idea seems golden. I hope she gets the lead out.

In the meantime, we’re waiting for X-Men: The Last Stand to come to theaters on May 26.

I had been looking forward to seeing Buck in concert this summer at his Crystal Palace in Bakersfield, California. I am very sorry that I won’t get that opportunity now. “Hillbilly Heaven” is an even richer place today.

By the way, I’m never sure how cutsey to make the titles of these posts. I refrained from calling this one, “Pfft! You Were Gone.” I hope my restraint is appreciated.

“Waid is the writer concentrating on Elongated Man right now, but he foresees characters shifting around as the series goes on. Booster Gold seems to be the character moving around the most between writer, and Waid has written some of his scenes.”

So there ya go, Mikey. Waid did have his Elongated Man story afterall! It just took 8 years to see it reach print!

“George Takei, who as “Star Trek’s” Sulu was part of the Starship Enterprise crew through three television seasons and six movies, has come out as a homosexual in the current issue of Frontiers, a biweekly Los Angeles magazine covering the gay and lesbian community.”

Looks sweet!

All kinds of little clues and glimpses on that baby. Thanks to NEWSARAMA for yet another exclusive.

There is a glorious new trailer here. You know, I really should read these kinds of books (i.e., Chronicles of Narnia, Lord of the Rings, etc.).

I think this movie is gonna kick some serious Narnia butt!

About an hour ago I received an email invitation to attend the Neil Gaiman reading at the Vancouver Public Library Thursday October 6, 2005 between noon and 2PM. I submitted a paragraph entry that had to explain why I thought The Straight should select me to attend the event (*this was the criteria for the contest). My entry was selected so I am off to see and hear Gaiman on Thursday! Gaiman will be reading from his new novel Anansi Boys and then taking questions from the audience.

MONITOR DUTY EXCLUSIVE: I have been given permission by The Straight to record the event with my Sony digital recorder and transcribe it for the Internet. Thanks much to John Burns at The Straight for giving me access in this regard.

Comic artist living legend Neil Adams has posted on his website that he will be providing an alternate cover for All Star Superman #1. So what is the catch? For every nine regular Quitely covers there will only be ONE Adams cover. So you pretty much better call your comic shop today to get one reserved. If you wait you won’t have a hope of getting one.

I am looking forward to this. Adams hooked me as a kid with his realistic take on how he drew Batman. It was truly amazing stuff to see on the comic rack as a seven-year old! To think that all these years down the road that the man is still producing a viable body of work that financially provides for him, too. Congrats, Neil!

NEWSARAMA does it again! They have released a gorgeous eight-page preview of the “All Star Superman #1″ by Grant Morrison & Frank Quitely that arrives November 2005. Click here to check out their link.

Grant Morrison is one of my writing heroes (up there with Mark Waid, Devin Grayson and Warren Ellis). He grounds his stuff in the original source material but also ‘updates’ so that it often seems like something he created from scratch. This is a series I am truly looking forward to.

Fortunately, I grew fond of Quitely’s art during his all-too-short stint on THE AUTHORITY. It is different. But it is also gorgeous and his eye/perspectives bring to light some lovely angles, textures and shadows.

Call your comic shop and have a copy put aside for you when it comes out!

Thanks to SuperHeroHype for the image!

THE DOOR is the world’s only religious satire magazine. It really has some funny stuff (especially the cartoons). Plus, the interviews can be quite amazing, too! Anyhow, I came across this image and thought it conveys the spirit of our times indeed.

Large Version

Thanks to THE DOOR for this great blast from the past of biblical scholarship!

Guess who is gonna die… perhaps.

Note the completely destroyed JLA Watchtower in the background… not looking good for the JLA… oh, and did you see the face/mask of a certain pirate on the cover, too?

Thanks to NEWSARAMA for the cover shot.

I stumbled across this great review of the “Batman Begins” movie. Yes, the movie came out two months ago… but this essay is worthy of reading and digesting for additional thoughts and meditations. Enjoy!

The studio is in Sydney, Australia and the closure will mean that 250 people will be looking for work next spring. The studio has produced many fine movies during its heyday.

Change truly is a part of life. But you know what. Sometimes today is the end of the ‘good years’ and the rest are simply mediocre or standard fair. It ends up simply only being about paying bills, wathing TV or living on a tight budget. Am I saying this in a fatalistic sense. No.

But to an artist who does hand-drawn animation, it really has to be scary/disturbing to see much of your skill becoming increasingly less valued and necessary in the movie market. That is the context of my comment.

Being flexible, learning new skills & believing that things can get better helps almost every situation in some regard. That being said, I do feel for the hundreds at this studio who will be starting over next spring and for those who may be at an age where starting over is very difficult.

Thanks to NEWSARAMA for an great re-introduction to a fave Marvel character from my youth. I bought very few Marvel titles… but Moon Night was one of them (*along with The Avengers and the Daredevil).

Novelist Charlie Huston will be taking a shot at writing the character in 2006 along with the artistic talent of David Finch. Here is hoping that they have a blast on the initial six-issue run!

If this rumour is true, this is brilliant… and will change everything for a season… you can mark me down as believing it as LIKELY TO BE TRUE!

The rumour is here. Do not go here if you do not want to be exposed to a MAJOR POSSIBLE SPOILER.

Dark Horizon was given a scoop by Warner to reveal the final version of the new Superman movie logo.

Funny that you ask.

LOTS!!!

Check here thanks to www.newsarama.com.

Brett, thank you for finally introducing some true class and innovation into the source material of the Marvel universe. Why try to get Colossus added to the cast (*as many fans have requested) when you can make such a prudently deft decision such as this. Here I’ve been concerned over nothing the past month when I heard online that you were taking over the movie’s director chair. Cheers, fine chap, for taking a calculated risk that is not likely to offend parents, X-fans, or anyone fond of the characters.

I am totally kidding. What a sleazeball.Did I mention that the two of the woman trying out for the role are Venus and Serena Williams (of tennis star fame)? Oh, did I also mention that Ratner also recently dated Serena Williams. Hmmmm… what a strange coincidence.