RANT: Dave's FCBD 07 Capsules
Dave Van Domelen
May 5, Cinco de Mayo, and also Free Comic Book Day for 2007. The shop
was packed (including a dozen or so little kids, which was heartening), so I
just grabbed a bunch of stuff and left. :)
As in previous years, I'm not going to review these as themselves...in
other words, I'm not really aiming at whether you should pick up these
specific books. After all, they're free, if you can find 'em and are the
least bit interested (and your shop lets you grab more than one title), just
snag 'em. Rather, seeing these as the advertising that they are, I will
decide whether I think you should consider picking up the regular titles, or
books by this publisher in the cases where these aren't tied to specific
titles. In some cases, of course, I will be biased by my existing buying
habits (BUY AMELIA RULES!), and in others I may recommend you look at it even
if I don't plan to buy it myself...after all, I know that there's plenty of
good stuff out there that simply doesn't strike my fancy.
In any case, keep in mind that these all interested me at least enough
to pick 'em up for free and write a few lines about, which puts 'em ahead of
a lot of books.
Heroclix: This year's FCBD figure is Batman from the upcoming DC Origins
set, with the Detective Comics #27 costume. It's a big figure, showing some
scale creep in the line, but the sculpt is pretty good. The stats, at least,
aren't horribly inflated. Might be worth picking up a couple boosters if
this line is heavily retro-themed instead of just salted with a handful of
these sort of figures.
Star Wars Miniatures: A 9 point orange-trim Republic Clone Trooper from
Ep3 is the freebie this year. The overall quality of SWMinis doesn't seem to
have really changed, and they're still made of a rubbery plastic that's hard
to modify. I really just grabbed this to stand next to my Lego Clone
Troopers. Oh, and it has the "Order 66" special ability.
The rest of the comics are in a very rough "how interesting do I think
they'll be" order, although I keep the two Marvel books together and have the
smaller-sized books on top for reasons of stacking ease. :)
Choose Your Weapon Sampler: Tokyopop - Standard manga-collection digest
size, hence being first. :) Samples of Archlord, Gyakushu!, Phantom,
Utopia's Avenger, and Warcraft: the Sunwell Trilogy (all from volume 1's
except the last, which is from volume 3). Strictly speaking, most if not
all of this is not manga, it's manhwa (Korean stuff). Archlord looks to be
pretty standard fantasy-comedy, and Gyakushu! is some sort of horror fantasy
revenge thing, neither interested me. Phantom feels like an attempt to mix
Gundam with Patlabor...moderately interesting, but nothing I plan to pick
up. Utopia's Avenger is incoherent demon-slaying action with art I found
nearly impossible to follow. And the Warcraft thing was mostly just a big
battle scene that meant nothing to me and was almost as hard to follow at
times as UA.
The Black Diamond Detective Agency: :01 First Second - Chapbook-sized
with victorian penny dreadful looks to it. Eddie Campbell's new work, a turn
of the century terrorism mystery in which a train is blown up, taking with it
much of a small Missouri town. This appears to be simply the first third of
the upcoming book, and as a mystery it seems Campbell is deliberately trying
to make things confusing at the start. While this would work well for the
complete book, it's a bit frustrating in this teaser, in that there's stuff
that might be more confusing than it needs to be (in the, "wait, who's THAT
character?" sense). Interesting, but not enough to get me to order the full
thing.
Comics 101: How-To & History Lessons From The Pros: TwoMorrows - This is
a sampler of TwoMorrows' various magazines, such as Draw, Alter Ego and the
Kirby Collector. So there's a mix of creation tips and comics history. The
art stuff is, as one might expect, a bit too short to really be useful, but
Fingeroth's "Top Ten Tips For Writers" is helpful. I hear that if you go to
twomorrows.com on May 5-6 you can even download free PDFs of the latest
issues of the six magazines excerpted here, a good idea if you're interested
in learning how to become a comics pro.
How To Draw: Free Comic Book Day Booklet: Wizard - Promos for a quartet
of How To Draw books Wizard is putting out. Some interesting stuff, most of
which I've seen before, but except for Calafiore's piece on roughs it shares
the usual "how to draw" problem of being a mix of "too basic to help any but
the rankest beginner" and "too complex to be absorbed by any but a
near-pro".
Comic Genesis: Didn't see a Keenspot book this time. As usual, a
sampler of a bunch of webcomics from what used to be Keenspace and is now
Comic Genesis. The only one of the batch that I already read is the sadly
on-hiatus Green Avenger (if you don't read it, go to www.green-avenger.com
and catch up!). The table of contents looks helpful at first, but since
there's no page numbers in the actual comic, it's not as useful as it might
have been. The level of art varies wildly, from total crap through Indy Cred
Scratchy or Manga Wannabe and up to some really well-polished stuff. A lot
seems to run towards fantasy and slice of life (and at least one furry slice
of life...am I jaded to want furry comics to actually be something other than
regular comics with animal heads? Like, to have the species thing matter in
the story? Bill Holbrook has spoiled me.). Having gotten through the whole
thing, unfortunately, I wasn't tempted to go to a single one of the webpages
for the comics inside.
Who Wants To be A Superhero?: Dark Horse - This is just a slim booklet
with the first few pages of the upcoming and long-delayed Feedback comic. I
guess they decided to push it back to coincide with the start of season two.
The Stan Lee writing is about as corny and dated as you'd expect, and the art
is murky and badly colored. I don't intend to pick up the regular issue.
Ape Entertainment's Comic Spectacular: Ape Entertainment - Anthology
showcasing several of Ape's books, with ads for the rest. Athena Voltaire is
a pretty standard "female Indiana Jones" sort with decent art, nothing really
grabbed me. White Picket Fences seems to be shooting for retro 50s archness,
and feels like it's pushing things too hard. The Goblin Chronicles is
promising, a fantasy series that, at least in this story, features a young
techie goblin prodigy. If the regular series is also about this kid, I might
well buy it. Teddy Scare is "spooky cute" stuff, nothing to write home
about. Go-Go Gorilla and the Jungle Crew has a sort of Captain Carrot feel,
but tries too hard to be camp. Bizarre New World could be interesting, but
it's solid narration with no actual dialogue, creating a sense of remove that
dampens any interest it might have generated.
Digital Webbing Jam 2007: Digital Webbing - An anthology, with E-Man,
Bloodrayne, The Fist of Justice, Zombie Highway and Punks. I had no interest
in Bloodrayne to start with, and this comic doesn't change that. Fist of
Justice has some nice Anthony "I want to be John Byrne" Castrillo art, but a
storyline that treads an overused downer path. The E-Man piece is mainly a
flashback on his origins and early adventures, eh. Zombie Highway has a nice
bit of character stuff, but doesn't tempt me into buying it. And the Punks
piece is just bad-stupid.
Liberty Comics #0: Heroic - Four done in one tales featuring the Golden
Age Liberty Girl, reprinted from various other recent comics. I pretty much
dropped Heroic's line over the past year, and none of these really inspires
me to return.
Nexus: Rude Dude Production - A collection of notable scenes from past
issues of Nexus, to help promote the relaunch this summer (well, it'll be
#99, so I dunno if "relaunch" is precisely the right word). The snippets
focus more on look and feel, although some of the background is included.
Each is introduced by a column of text presumably written by series writer
Mike Baron. Nexus is one of those titles I've dipped into once in a while,
mainly as a result of crossovers and events (I read a lot of other First
Comics books back in the day), but it never really grabbed me. Seemed too
full of "weird for its own sake" stuff. And while I'm sure some people will
be thrilled to see it return, I won't be picking up #99.
Justice League of America #0: DC - Eh, what the heck, it's free. :)
This bounces between "yesterday" scenes set in what's probably the new
rejiggered JLA history and "tomorrow" ones set in possible futures, with a
pile of artists contributing. Some good bits, but neither Meltzer's writing
nor Turner's contributions to the art (which are pretty bad IMO) inspire me
to pick up the regular series.
Buzzboy/Roboy: The Buzz & The 'Bot! #0: Sky-Dog Press - Some light and
frothy tales. One each with Buzzboy and Roboy, one in which they more or
less team up, and a bit of autobio from series creator John Gallagher.
There's also a short "how to draw robots" piece that focuses on really simple
retro "pile of shapes" robots. Decent, but I'm not really interested in
seeking out any of the series promoted.
Owly Helping Hands: Top Shelf Production - This is one of those books I
recommend in general without actually buying it myself...but I do pick up
every FCBD copy. :) The main Owly story this time is, as usual, wordless
(but with symbol/picture word balloons), and has Owly helping a friend with a
gift idea. The backup is Korgi, a dog that can apparently light fires with
his mind, I think. Owly is a little too cutesy for me, which is saying
something. Korgi doesn't interest me at all.
Free Comic Book Day 2007 Marvel Adventures #1: Marvel - MA Iron Man and
Hulk stories, plus a Franklin Richards story. Within the constraints of such
a short piece in a "making up new continuity as we go along" setting, Van
Lente turns in a reasonably clever story. I might give MA Iron Man #1 a look
when it comes out. Paul Benjamin's MA Hulk story isn't as interesting,
though. And the Franklin Richards piece was...ehn.
Free Comic Book Day 2007 Spider-Man #1: Marvel - An all-new Dan Slott
and Phil Jimenez Spidey story, woot. Plus a preview of the upcoming
throwdown between Spidey and Iron Man. The main story may or may not be in
continuity, it's hard to tell (it feels like it's post-Back In Black, but
it's hard to say for sure, especially given that at least one dead guy shows
up alive in a crowd scene). Still, Slott puts together a fun story with
great Jimenez art...except that's not Overdrive, that's Crosswise! (This
moment of Transformers geekery has been brought to you by the Bugatti
Veyron.) The preview of Amazing #544 was okay, but I doubt I'll go back to
picking up that title regularly.
The Astounding Wolf-Man #1: Image - Oddly, this is the only version of
the first issue that's coming out, with the regular for-pay #2 solicited for
July. Kirkman and Howard do a decent job of setting up the premise, although
I feel like I've seen it before enough times that I don't feel much desire to
get that #2. It also has some short previews of other Image books, including
a monthly Brit by someone other than Kirkman.
Amelia Rules FCBD 2007: Renaissance Press - Sometimes, I think that FCBD
doubles the output on this title. :) But Gownley always puts new stuff here,
so I make sure to get it. A decent introduction to the main kids of the
title, although it leaves out a few of the second-tier kids (like Violet) and
all of the adults. It also features one of the most elaborate Reggie
definitions to date. There's also a backup of one of Gownley's favorite
comics, Apathy Kat, which is relaunching soon. It had some good points, but
felt too inconsistent, like its creator was splicing several different
premises together. It's also kinda disturbing that Ap wears no clothes and
physically behaves like a regular cat (curling up on a windowsill, for
instance) when all of his friends are more anthropomorphized (clothes,
upright posture, etc).
Unseen Peanuts: Fantagraphics - Dude, Peanuts strips from the 50s and
60s. This is one worth seeking out on its own merits, even if you have to go
to eBay or something to do it. Why? Well, if reprints over a hundred strips
that were never reprinted prior to Fantagraphics' Complete Peanuts series,
and even has a few that their collections haven't gotten to yet. Plus,
there's notes speculating on why a particular strip was never reprinted,
ranging from "it just wasn't very good" to "obscure topical references" or
"took the characters in a way Schulz later went counter to".
Dave Van Domelen, "I swear, you've gotta be the WORST bad guy I've ever
met! Seriously! Who owns a car in the city?! Insurance, upkeep, the price
of parking...no wonder you've turned to crime." - Spider-Man
Lawrence Watt-Evans
<dva...@haven.eyrie.org> wrote:
> Dave's Free Comic Book Day 2007 Capsules
Hey, no LOVE & CAPES?
--
My webpage is at http://www.watt-evans.com
The fourth issue of Helix is at http://www.helixsf.com
The tenth Ethshar novel has been serialized at http://www.ethshar.com/thevondishambassador1.html
Jason Michael
I don't understand or have any inclination to learn Heroclix, but the
figure looks great beside my computer. Better than any Batman figure
you'd find in the toy stores.
> Star Wars Miniatures: A 9 point orange-trim Republic Clone Trooper from
> Ep3 is the freebie this year. The overall quality of SWMinis doesn't seem to
> have really changed, and they're still made of a rubbery plastic that's hard
> to modify. I really just grabbed this to stand next to my Lego Clone
> Troopers. Oh, and it has the "Order 66" special ability.
>
> The rest of the comics are in a very rough "how interesting do I think
> they'll be" order, although I keep the two Marvel books together and have the
> smaller-sized books on top for reasons of stacking ease. :)
>
> Choose Your Weapon Sampler: Tokyopop - Standard manga-collection digest
> size, hence being first. :) Samples of Archlord, Gyakushu!, Phantom,
> Utopia's Avenger, and Warcraft: the Sunwell Trilogy (all from volume 1's
> except the last, which is from volume 3). Strictly speaking, most if not
> all of this is not manga, it's manhwa (Korean stuff). Archlord looks to be
> pretty standard fantasy-comedy, and Gyakushu! is some sort of horror fantasy
> revenge thing, neither interested me. Phantom feels like an attempt to mix
> Gundam with Patlabor...moderately interesting, but nothing I plan to pick
> up. Utopia's Avenger is incoherent demon-slaying action with art I found
> nearly impossible to follow. And the Warcraft thing was mostly just a big
> battle scene that meant nothing to me and was almost as hard to follow at
> times as UA.
I couldn't get into any of these stories. The art just didn't draw me
in- in fact, it actively kept me from becoming interested in them.
> The Black Diamond Detective Agency: :01 First Second - Chapbook-sized
> with victorian penny dreadful looks to it. Eddie Campbell's new work, a turn
> of the century terrorism mystery in which a train is blown up, taking with it
> much of a small Missouri town. This appears to be simply the first third of
> the upcoming book, and as a mystery it seems Campbell is deliberately trying
> to make things confusing at the start. While this would work well for the
> complete book, it's a bit frustrating in this teaser, in that there's stuff
> that might be more confusing than it needs to be (in the, "wait, who's THAT
> character?" sense). Interesting, but not enough to get me to order the full
> thing.
Nice design, but I'm waiting for the complete book, which I ordered
when it was solicited.
I'm a huge Nexus fan, but I don't think this was a very good intro to
the character. I don't know that I would agree with your comment about
the book being "weird for its own sake" as I always found it to be a
very logical, well-thought out universe similar to Levitz's Legion
run. Having said that, I think starting a new book now from issue 99
is going to be a tough go. I wish Baron and Rude luck, but I just
don't see the book being very successful in today's market. I'll
follow it as long as they publish it, however.
> Justice League of America #0: DC - Eh, what the heck, it's free. :)
> This bounces between "yesterday" scenes set in what's probably the new
> rejiggered JLA history and "tomorrow" ones set in possible futures, with a
> pile of artists contributing. Some good bits, but neither Meltzer's writing
> nor Turner's contributions to the art (which are pretty bad IMO) inspire me
> to pick up the regular series.
I picked it up simply for a few of the artists. (Not Turner, BTW- I
like Gene Ha, Kevin Maguire, J.H. Williams and Tony Harris) I haven't
managed to read it, but I'm sure I'll make myself plow through it at
some point. I used to buy every DC Universe title but I'm out of the
loop on this stuff. I'm not the target audience anymore, I'm more of a
"Showcase Presents..." kind of guy.
Did you pick up the Legion book? I got it but haven't read it yet.
> Buzzboy/Roboy: The Buzz & The 'Bot! #0: Sky-Dog Press - Some light and
> frothy tales. One each with Buzzboy and Roboy, one in which they more or
> less team up, and a bit of autobio from series creator John Gallagher.
> There's also a short "how to draw robots" piece that focuses on really simple
> retro "pile of shapes" robots. Decent, but I'm not really interested in
> seeking out any of the series promoted.
> Owly Helping Hands: Top Shelf Production - This is one of those books I
> recommend in general without actually buying it myself...but I do pick up
> every FCBD copy. :) The main Owly story this time is, as usual, wordless
> (but with symbol/picture word balloons), and has Owly helping a friend with a
> gift idea. The backup is Korgi, a dog that can apparently light fires with
> his mind, I think. Owly is a little too cutesy for me, which is saying
> something. Korgi doesn't interest me at all.
I know Owly has a lot of buzz as a great all-ages book, but I really
don't think much of it. I find the art a little stiff and the stories
trite. My 9 year old daughters picked it up because they thought the
cover was cute, but they haven't read it yet. My wife got last year's
FCBD issue and she admitted she'd never got around to reading it even
though it's been lying beside the bed for the past year. It seems the
design of the character is better than the actual experience of
reading it. Maybe Owly should be licenced to Underoos.
> Free Comic Book Day 2007 Marvel Adventures #1: Marvel - MA Iron Man and
> Hulk stories, plus a Franklin Richards story. Within the constraints of such
> a short piece in a "making up new continuity as we go along" setting, Van
> Lente turns in a reasonably clever story. I might give MA Iron Man #1 a look
> when it comes out. Paul Benjamin's MA Hulk story isn't as interesting,
> though. And the Franklin Richards piece was...ehn.
> Free Comic Book Day 2007 Spider-Man #1: Marvel - An all-new Dan Slott
> and Phil Jimenez Spidey story, woot. Plus a preview of the upcoming
> throwdown between Spidey and Iron Man. The main story may or may not be in
> continuity, it's hard to tell (it feels like it's post-Back In Black, but
> it's hard to say for sure, especially given that at least one dead guy shows
> up alive in a crowd scene). Still, Slott puts together a fun story with
> great Jimenez art...except that's not Overdrive, that's Crosswise! (This
> moment of Transformers geekery has been brought to you by the Bugatti
> Veyron.) The preview of Amazing #544 was okay, but I doubt I'll go back to
> picking up that title regularly.
Haven't gotten to this, but looking forward to it. I picked it up
solely for Slott's story.
> The Astounding Wolf-Man #1: Image - Oddly, this is the only version of
> the first issue that's coming out, with the regular for-pay #2 solicited for
> July. Kirkman and Howard do a decent job of setting up the premise, although
> I feel like I've seen it before enough times that I don't feel much desire to
> get that #2. It also has some short previews of other Image books, including
> a monthly Brit by someone other than Kirkman.
I like the art but haven't read this one yet.
> Amelia Rules FCBD 2007: Renaissance Press - Sometimes, I think that FCBD
> doubles the output on this title. :) But Gownley always puts new stuff here,
> so I make sure to get it. A decent introduction to the main kids of the
> title, although it leaves out a few of the second-tier kids (like Violet) and
> all of the adults. It also features one of the most elaborate Reggie
> definitions to date. There's also a backup of one of Gownley's favorite
> comics, Apathy Kat, which is relaunching soon. It had some good points, but
> felt too inconsistent, like its creator was splicing several different
> premises together. It's also kinda disturbing that Ap wears no clothes and
> physically behaves like a regular cat (curling up on a windowsill, for
> instance) when all of his friends are more anthropomorphized (clothes,
> upright posture, etc).
I was hoping to get this but didn't see it.
> Unseen Peanuts: Fantagraphics - Dude, Peanuts strips from the 50s and
> 60s. This is one worth seeking out on its own merits, even if you have to go
> to eBay or something to do it. Why? Well, if reprints over a hundred strips
> that were never reprinted prior to Fantagraphics' Complete Peanuts series,
> and even has a few that their collections haven't gotten to yet. Plus,
> there's notes speculating on why a particular strip was never reprinted,
> ranging from "it just wasn't very good" to "obscure topical references" or
> "took the characters in a way Schulz later went counter to".
>
I'm buying the Complete Peanuts but I had to get this just for the
notes. Good stuff.
Other books of note:
Little Archie- A fun book with a new story by Bob Bolling, the
original artist/writer of the 60s Little Archie tales.
Bongo Comics Free-For-All- Every year I find this the best FCBD book.
New short stories featuring the Simpsons and Futurama featuring
talents such as Evan Dorkin and Tom Peyer. Something like this lends a
ittle diversity to the market while being something that virtually
everyone is familiar with.
Family Guy/ Hack-Slash flipbbok by Devil's Due. Another high profile
property. Not as well done as the Bongo book, but directed to a
similar audience.
Lynda Barry FCBD Activity Book- Drawn & Quarterly's contribution was a
god-send to me as I am really looking forward to their reprinting
Barry's Ernie Pook's comic. I have a feeling her dense pages probably
aren't what most people are looking for on Free Comic Book Day though
Lone ranger/ Battlestar Gallactica flipbook- More properties that are
familiar to a mass audience.
Mickey Mouse- Gemstone's book is a collection of daily newspaper
strips from the 30s. Classic stuff, but I thought the cover could have
been better. Robin Hood's face creeped me out.
Future Shock- Image's sampler of pages from most of their flagship
books. The excerpt from Godland has me intrigued. I may pick up the
hardcover collection that is due in a few months. Anyone recommend
this book? Am I better off getting the collection or the single
issues? I am still a sucker for pamphlets if the book has a good
letters page.
Comics Festival! This is a collection published by Toronto's Beguiling
to hype the Toronto Comic Arts Festival. Very intriguing book with
such Canadian creators as Darwyn Cooke, Cameron Stewart, J. Bone, &
Steve Ralston. Recomended if you can find it.
Love and Capes- Witty strip. Apparently this reprints the fourth issue
of this book, but I was unfamiliar with it. Based on this I might pick
it up again.
Gumby- The store I was in went through a ton of copies of this - one
to every kid under about twelve. I was surprised because I doubt any
of them even know who Gumby is, but I guess there's something
appealing about the green guy, or about Rick Geary's art on the book.
I hope they enjoyed the story by Bob Burden. I certainly did. For me,
this is a much better all- ages book than Owly.
Jason
jason michael @ canada . com
Dave Van Domelen
Jason Michael <jwmi...@sympatico.ca> wrote:
>Did you pick up the Legion book? I got it but haven't read it yet.
It was just a reprint of LSH31C #1, right? I left it on the shelf.
Dave Van Domelen, reviewed the non-FCBD version a few weeks ago.
Lawrence Watt-Evans
wrote:
>Love and Capes- Witty strip. Apparently this reprints the fourth issue
>of this book, but I was unfamiliar with it. Based on this I might pick
>it up again.
Not a reprint; this IS the fourth issue. All new.
Jason Michael
> On 7 May 2007 13:32:47 -0700, Jason Michael <jwmich...@sympatico.ca>
> wrote:
>
> >Love and Capes- Witty strip. Apparently this reprints the fourth issue
> >of this book, but I was unfamiliar with it. Based on this I might pick
> >it up again.
>
> Not a reprint; this IS the fourth issue. All new.
>
Thanks for the correction. It'll prevent frustration if I decide to
buy the back issues, hunting for a book that doesn't exist! The more I
think about this book the more I liked it. Some scenes linger in my
mind.
Wayne S Garmil
>
I found the Keenspot book in 2 of the 4 stores I checked (a thrid had
already gave away all their copies before I got there), but none of
those stores received the Comic Genesis book even though 3 of the
stores had ordered it. Three stores are in eastern MA north of Boston
and one in southern NH. Did anyone actually get this book? It was
one of the books I had wanted to pick up. Hopefully the website will
have it for sale for $1 plus shipping as they did last year.
> Justice League of America #0: DC - Eh, what the heck, it's free.
Was this a reprint of JLA #0 from earlier in the year or did it have
new/different material in it (since it came out after 52 #52)?
Wayne
--
_ __ _ __ | I see the girls walk by dressed in
' ) / // / / ) / | their summer clothes; I have to turn
/ / / o // __/ / __. __ __/ | my head until my darkness goes...
(_(_/ <_</_(_/ (__/ (_/|_/ (_(_/_ | -Rolling Stones, "Paint It Black"
Lawrence Watt-Evans
wrote:
>On May 8, 12:03 am, Lawrence Watt-Evans <l...@sff.net> wrote:
It's a favorite of mine, and I wish it was better known!
Jason Michael
> On 8 May 2007 09:22:37 -0700, Jason Michael <jwmich...@sympatico.ca>
> wrote:
>
> >On May 8, 12:03 am, Lawrence Watt-Evans <l...@sff.net> wrote:
> >> On 7 May 2007 13:32:47 -0700, Jason Michael <jwmich...@sympatico.ca>
> >> wrote:
>
> >> >Love and Capes- Witty strip. Apparently this reprints the fourth issue
> >> >of this book, but I was unfamiliar with it. Based on this I might pick
> >> >it up again.
>
> >> Not a reprint; this IS the fourth issue. All new.
>
> >Thanks for the correction. It'll prevent frustration if I decide to
> >buy the back issues, hunting for a book that doesn't exist! The more I
> >think about this book the more I liked it. Some scenes linger in my
> >mind.
>
> It's a favorite of mine, and I wish it was better known!
>
With any luck, the Free Comic Book Day exposure will help with that.