A Manchester pub/theatre is staging a play based on Alan Moore and Ian Gibson’s legendary 2000AD comic series, The Ballad of Halo Jones. James Bacon has been to see it, and has written a review for Forbidden Planet International. It sounds like it was an excellent event. As far as I can make out, the play was only staged for a few nights, and has now finished its run. Maybe someone will decide to stage it elsewhere soon.
Dramatic Presentation, Long Form nominee, James?
Oh dear, I haven’t blogged all day, have I? Bad Cheryl.
More books tomorrow, but for now here’s something much more weird. In my Google Reader feeds today I found this post about a new type of experiment in quantum physics. One of the really odd things about quantum theory is that particles can behave as either waves or particles, which to our eyes is hugely inconsistent of them. The new experiment, if I understand it correctly, says that we are wrong, not the particles. That is, particles have a consistent nature but, due to our flawed understanding, or possibly perception, of the universe, we can only see them as having this odd dual nature.
Er, can someone who understands physics better than I do please check to see if I have understood this correctly?
And talking of dual natures, Demon Knights #4 is out. Paul Cornell has been trailing this as featuring the origin of the Shining Knight, and so it does, but we don’t really learn much. For those of you not following the book, the Shining Knight is a) Welsh and b) apparently trans or intersex. You can see why I am interested. DC and the other characters in the book consistently refer to the Knight as “she”, but the Knight is drawn fairly androgynously and rejects the female label. Well, in the new issue we find out how the Knight got super powers and a quest, but not much more than that. There’s one key panel in which Marlin says, “You interest me, young squire. You have two natures”. And that’s all we are getting, for now.
Wave/particle. Male/female. Maybe we are not just looking properly.
And if that hasn’t broken your brains, here’s Andrej Pejic being fabulous.
The indefatigable Ann and Jeff VanderMeer have launched a new online magazine, Weird Fiction Review. It appears from the first issue that it will contain non-fiction, fiction, art, even a webcomic. This month’s fiction is a Belgian story newly translated by the excellent Edward Gauvin.
This is, of course, all tied up with the mindbogglingly huge anthology, The Weird, that Ann and Jeff have just produced. 750,000 words of fiction from all over the world, including some stunning new translations. At the speed I’m reading these days it would take me several months to get through it.
If you’d like to learn more about the book, and about Ann’s departure from Weird Tales, there is a fascinating podcast interview with the VanderMeers on Tony C. Smith’s Sofanauts show.
The absence of women issue is by no means confined to science fiction. The comics industry appears to be far worse. Nevertheless, there are still a few hardy souls willing to risk public humiliation by using the f-word in public (that would be “feminism”, of course). This blog post interviews one such: Kyrax2, who was busily asking awkward questions of people at the recent San Diego Comic-Con. There’s not a lot of point in clicking through unless you enjoy making yourself depressed, but I did want to highlight one thing from the interview.
Kyrax2 is talking about how the head of DC, Dan Didio, had been cleverly avoiding answering her questions. She then goes on to say this:
On the other hand, Paul Cornell came directly to where I was sitting as soon as the New 52 panel ended and said, “I heard what you said, and I’d like to take a minute to try to sell to you directly.†He told me that his new swords and sorcery comic, Demon Knights, would have a majority female cast and that he was committed to keeping it that way. I am utterly uninterested in swords and sorcery, but I will be subscribing to a full year of Demon Knights anyway, because Paul Cornell made me feel like he cared about my opinion, both as a fan and as a human being. I want to give this comic a chance, and I think it would be fantastic if everyone reading this article would at least pick up issue #1 of Demon Knights and give it a chance, too. Cornell’s also writing Stormwatch, and says of Apollo and Midnighter in the linked article, “Yes, Apollo and Midnighter are still gay men. They’re still out and proud. I wouldn’t have written it otherwise.â€
And that, dear readers, is how to deal with shouty feminists.
Paul mate, I am so very proud of you.
Thankfully there are many wonderful persons of the male persuasion in the world. Here are a couple of shout-outs.
Firstly to Joe Gordon who has done a fine post on the Womanthology project.
And secondly to Marco and Lee at Angry Robot. You probably already know that they publish Lauren Beukes, Kaaren Warren and Aliette de Bodard. Also in the pipeline are Jo Anderton and Anne Lyle. And today they added Madeline Ashby. All of these ladies write science fiction. (Aliette’s novels are fantasy, but her Hugo-nominated story is SF set at a later time in the same world.)
See, it’s not hard to find women SF writers when you put your mind to it. Or indeed to publish them and have a massive international success on your hands. My only regret is that, of all those ladies, Anne is the only Brit. I guess it must be something to do with the climate.
This morning a couple of people have pointed me at something called Womanthology. To quote from their “Who we are” page:
Womanthology is an anthology graphic novel created entirely by women for Charity. The purpose of the book is to showcase the works of female creators of every age and experience levels.
They are financing the project through Kickstarter.
It probably isn’t necessary to point you at something Neil Gaiman has tweeted about, but just in case there are a few of you out there who are not on Twitter, or don’t follow Neil, I’d like to direct you to this press release from the Comic Book Legal Defense Fund.
The actual case in question is about a US citizen who was arrested at the Canadian border on charges of possessing child pornography because he had manga on his laptop. In part this is simply re-hashing old issues. Cartoon sex is not the same as real sex, and in manga all characters tend to look a bit child-like to someone who is not familiar with the art style. However, as the press release notes, this is part of a much wider trend of border guards searching the computers and other portable devices belonging to travelers. Do you know exactly what is on your laptop? Have you checked all of the spam email you get to be sure no pornographic pictures remain?
The main issue here is that border guards are, to a large extent, outside of the law. While you are asking for admission to another country you are neither under their laws nor your own. Eventually this poor American kid will go before a Canadian court, but if the judge throws the case out he will probably have no recourse, and the guards who arrested him will remain free to do the same to other people.
Much of my weekend has been spent at the Bristol Comics Expo. It all seemed to be going very smoothly, and from talking to friends like Simon Gurr and Simon Breeze who had tables in the Small Press section people seemed to do decent business. Next year it looks like we’ll be back in the big shed at Temple Meads (now apparently renamed the Brunel Hall), which is great news. Exciting things may also be happening in the Ramada. Watch this space.
I arrived too late for the women in comics panel, but my friend Marjorie went and she said it was good. What I can do, however, is note that there were many fine women comics creators in the Small Press section. Here are a few.
I’ll start with my Greek friend, Sissy Pantelis. She doesn’t have much out in print at the moment, but she has a bunch of projects underway, including one with Markosia. There’s a review of the one-shot, Dream Lover, which Sissy did with her artist friend, Valia Kapadai, over at Geek Syndicate.
Sissy pointed me at UK-based manga artist, Sonia Leong. You can find her website here. Kevin, if you haven’t clicked through yet, do so now. Everyone else, I can particularly recommend this and this.
Not exactly comics, but a great female artist, is Anne Stokes. If you are into dragons and goth women you will absolutely love this. If I was still doing Salon Futura I would have been talking to Anne about a cover (though I probably couldn’t afford her).
In a very different vein my next shout-out is to local Bristol illustrator, Katie Green. I’m impressed with anyone who has degrees in both biology and sequential art. Most of what she has out at the moment is fairly lightweight in terms of themes, but I’m looking forward to seeing Lighter Than My Shadow, a graphic novel that Katie has sold to Jonathan Cape, which is a memoir of her struggle with eating disorders.
Finally in the round-up of ladies we have another Bristol-based artist: political cartoonist BlueLou. She’s already had work in The Guardian. And she’s the only woman political cartoonist that I know of.
I’d also like to make brief mention of a couple of guys. First up is Geof Banyard who does the wonderfully silly Fetishman comic, and also a fair amount of steampunk stuff. Anyone whose stall includes zeppelins, squid and a comic full of spoof Daily Malice outrage articles is OK by me.
And last but by no means least I have finally, after much prodding by Joe Gordon, got hold of all four issues of Spandex, a small press comic about a group of gay superheroes from Brighton. This deserves a proper review, for which you will have to wait. Sorry.
I’ll be spending much of the weekend at the Bristol Comics Expo. They are sold out, so there’s no point in my encouraging you to come along, but I will get to see a bunch of good friends, including Paul Cornell, Sissy Pantelis and Simon Gurr. The event hashtag is #bristolexpo. I’ll do my best to report on what is going on, and I hope to grab a quick interview with Bryan Talbot about Grandville.
The first ever Caerdydd Comics Expo has come and gone, and the general impression appears to be that it was a great success. The event was held in a Mercure hotel near the city center. Advance tickets sold out a week or two before the event, and there were long lines of young people (some in very fine costumes) hoping to get some of the few at-the-door tickets. I’m always happy to see young girls with green hair, and young boys in pink wigs and schoolgirl uniforms. I like to think that if this happens enough various shouty conservative folks will explode.
The main dealers’ room was quite large, but Mike Allwood told me that he could have taken a lot more people if he had had the room. Next year’s event is already planned to be two days. Panels were upstairs in a room that was rarely filled, but not deserted either. It was great to catch up with good friends such as Paul Cornell, Sissy Pantelis, Dave and Barry from Geek Syndicate and Simon Gurr. Tony Lee, wherever you are, you were sadly missed. I got to introduce John and Yvonne Meaney to the comics world, and John repaid me by letting me fondle his Neal Adams X-Men comics, which are every bit as gorgeous as I remember from when I was a kid.
Also I got to be in Caerdydd on match day, albeit that the action all took place far away in Rome. Wales won. A good day all round.
After a couple of quiet months it is time to start convention travel again. This coming weekend I be doing production on Salon Futura #6, which should provide a nice Valentine’s present for you all on Monday. Jonathan Clements has a very appropriate article. The rest of us are rather less romantic.
The following weekend (19th) I shall be in London for Picocon. Juliet McKenna is one of their Guests of Honour, so someone from BristolCon has to be there to show support. It will be great to catch up with Juliet and their other GoHs, Kari Sperring and Paul McAuley. I’ll be in London on the Friday night, but I have to be on a train home on Saturday evening.
And the weekend after that I shall be in Cardiff on the Saturday for their inaugural comic expo. Paul Cornell will be there, as will some of the BristolCon artists. I’m looking forward to meeting Steve Upham as he has provided the cover for Salon Futura #6. I’m dragging John Meaney along to see what all this comic stuff is all about. And my pal Barry Nugent of Geek Syndicate will be launching his first graphic novel, which should be cause for celebration.
I will, of course, have copies of Dark Spires available at both these events, should you wish to avail yourself of the special convention discount rate.
Here’s one we missed. For several years now Wendy Pini has been creating a web comic based on Edgar Allan Poe’s “The Masque of the Red Death.” The story ended in mid 2010 so it becomes eligible this year. The story isn’t a straight adaptation of the Poe original. Rather it has been moved into a science fiction setting, with a strong m-m romance at its center. As I understand it, Poe hinted at a variety of sexual practices in the original (and could scarcely have done much more when he wrote it), but Pini appears to have gone all out for the m-m romance audience.
I haven’t had a chance to read it through, and from what I have seen the limited animation and the dialog are both pretty clunky, but the art, as one would expect from Pini, is sumptuous. You can find the whole thing online here.
With Ian Culbard’s adaptation of The Mountains of Madness also a potential nominee we could be in the bizarre position of having both Poe and Lovecraft on the Hugo ballot this year. I imagine that would outrage some people in fandom, and appeal mightily to the sense of whimsy of others.
FWIW my probable ballot looks like this:
But that could change as there is some really good stuff that I haven’t looked at yet.
Via Bryan Talbot, who is a guest speaker, I have discovered that there is a one-day academic conference on “Surrealism, science fiction and comics” at Somerset House on Saturday January 22nd. It is organized by the Courtauld Institute of Art Research Forum. Admission is £15 and advance booking appears to be required. Details here. Anyone going?
One of the UK’s finest comics artists, Simon Gane, lives in Bath. Today he had a signing at the local comics shop, and I went along to say hello. What I was mainly looking to pick up was Dark Rain [buy isbn=”9781848568440″], the graphic novel that Simon has just produced in collaboration with Mat Johnson. It is a fine piece of work — a thriller set in New Orleans in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina. What I was most impressed by, however, was Paris [buy isbn=”9781593620813″]. Published by SLG in San José, this is a delightful story of a lesbian love affair between Juliet, an American art student, and Deborah, a rich English girl. It is set in the 1950s so the social attitudes it portrays are a bit antedivulvian at times, but they are spot on for the English upper classes. Because what draws the two girls together is their common love of art, Watson and Gane are able to pay tribute to many great artists. Juliet and Deborah visit the Lourve together, and tucked in the corner of one frame is a small boy reading Tintin. There’s also love for Jean-Auguste-Dominique Ingres. Those of you who are into fantasy art might like this.
As you doubtless all know by now, Neil Gaiman has suggested that on Hallowe’en we all give each other scary books. All Hallow’s Read, as the new tradition is called, has been swiftly endorsed by other writers and critics, including Stephen King and the Washington Post.
I’m not a big fan of horror myself, but there is a book coming out this week that I fancy giving myself for Hallowe’en. It is a graphic novel adaption of H.P. Lovecraft’s At The Mountains of Madness, and judging from this FPI review, it is very good.
Bryan Talbot’s brilliant graphic novel, Grandville, missed being on the Hugo ballot by just one vote this year. Let’s not make the same mistake again, people. Look!
Grandville Mon Amour: The badger is back. [buy isbn=”9780224090001″]
As some of you have already noticed, I am on a panel at Worldcon about science fiction and graphic novels. The contention, as Jeff Beeler put it, is that the new Hugo category is effectively for, “the best science fiction graphic novels that people who do not read graphic novels on a regular basis know about.” Paul Cornell has already waxed lyrical upon the subject. Now it is my turn. But I don’t read nearly as many comics and graphic novels as some of you. So I want your suggestions. What should we be nominating for the Best Graphic Novel Hugo next year?
Remember, the work has to either be first published in 2010 or, in the case of a serial work, the final issue has to be published in 2010.
Diana Prince has been shopping. The new togs are seriously cool. This is enough to make me want to turn up at a convention in a superhero costume (except, of course, I’d need to lose a lot of weight in some places, and add it in others).
The comics App on the iPad is called Comics (clever that) and comes from a distributor called Comixology. It doesn’t yet support all of the publishers in their paper catalog. In particular it is missing DC and Vertigo. However, there is a lot you can buy. Marvel is there, and Dark Horse has just signed up, which means you can get Grandville. That looks absolutely awesome.
The comic I want to talk about here, however, comes from another smaller publisher, BOOM!. The title is Dust to Dust, billed as a prequel to their adaptation of Phil Dick’s Do Android’s Dream of Electric Sheep. The writer is Chris Roberson. You can get a free sample on the iPad, but Chris has kindly sent me a copy of issue #1, so here’s a quick review.
The term “prequel” is probably a bit of a misnomer. What Dust to Dust appears to be is an independent comic series that is set in the world of DADOES and uses similar themes, but is not about the same characters. Those of you who enjoy debating the meaning of scenes in Blade Runner will be disappointed that Charlie Victor, the android hunter in the story, admits up front to being an android himself. On the other hand, those of you who hate movie adaptations of books will enjoy the fact that Chris appears to be making good use of Mercerism and other aspects of the novel.
Robert Adler’s art is appropriately dark and cyberpunky. The story is set in San Francisco and issue #1 includes several locations that I am very familiar with. Even BART gets a few panels.
One thing that is very clear from the opening issue is that it has been written by someone who knows his science fiction. It feels right, from a genre point of view. Chris has also tried to give it an modern feel by have the major viewpoint character, Dr. Samantha Wu, think in Twitter posts. Limiting yourself to 140 characters is a useful discipline for thought bubbles.
Chris has done enough set-up in #1 to get me wanting to know how things will develop in future issues. And, because I’ll be able to order them on the iPad, I will be able to do so as issues come out. When DC and Vertigo finally sign up and I can also follow Fables, Cinderella and iZombie, plus Paul Cornell’s run on Action Comics, I shall be very happy. And my bank manager will be very worried.
The first time I heard about iZombie was in the bar of the Delta hotel in Montreal in 2009. I don’t think Chris Roberson was actually there, but we were in a bar at a convention so the usual brat pack was assembled and naturally Chris’s name cropped up in conversation. Someone (possibly Lou Anders) had heard that Chris had a deal with a comic publisher for an original series featuring a teenage girl zombie detective. The sense of respect around the table was palpable. Getting a comic deal is great, but coming up with the idea of a comic about a teenage girl zombie detective is just awesome. We all figured that Chris had a winner on his hands.
Having met Vertigo editor Shelly Bond at the Bristol Comics Expo last month I now know how strangely they go about commissioning new titles. Shelly has ideas for books and pitches them to writers she likes. According to an interview at Comic Book Resources she did this with Chris; she wanted him to revive an old title called Gravedigger. Chris went away to think about it, and had an epiphany.
You see, working as a grave digger is an ideal job for a zombie. You have a plentiful supply of fresh brains delivered on a regular basis, and don’t have to kill anyone to get them. That might just help you stay in decent condition. And it does for one lucky zombie girl, Gwen Dylan. The only problem is that when she eats someone’s brains she ingests their memories as well. Some of them have died in unfortunate circumstances, and won’t let Gwen rest until she has sorted their former lives out for them.
There’s a certain element of Scooby Do to all this. Gwen, after all, is a teenager. When not digging graves she likes to hang out in the local diner with her friends. Those friends happen to be Ellie, a ghost who died back in the 1960s and hasn’t yet given up on Mary Quant fashions, and Scott, a young were-terrier. The girls, being girls, call the boy “Spot”, and he, being a boy, is forever trying to get up close and personal with Gwen. Can you imagine, ladies, what sort of a suitor a were-terrier makes? Quite. Down boy, and stop slavering.
That’s not all, because Chris manages to pack even more set-up into the debut issue. We have a few panels that show a pair of vicious undead hunters have arrived in town. They are bound to cause trouble. There’s a vampire girl who doesn’t get introduced. And a few wordless flashback panels from our first set of consumed memories doubtless provide clues as to how the original owner of the brains died. Chris manages all of this setup with a splendid economy of words (a marked contrast to Jonathan Ross’s wordiness in Turf).
The art is by Mike Allred and is both very beautiful and fairly traditional as comic art goes (again contrast with Turf). The same CBR interview has Mike say that he based Gwen’s appearance on a favorite rock star. I suspect that he means Debbie Harry.
Obviously this comic won’t be for everyone. I can imagine that teenage boys will find reading a comic in which the lead characters are teenage girls to be rather difficult. I might worry about teenage girl characters being written by a adult man, but I’m pretty sure that Chris gets Allison to vet his scripts before turning them in. For those of us not addicted to muscle-bound, macho heroes, iZombie is a welcome breath of fresh air. The opening issue suggests that there is plenty of story to be told, and there will be some good laughs as well as drama along the way. I’m looking forward to reading more.
