There are no hotels in San Diego–we’re all doomed. I booked on the wrong week. Heh.
Thank you to Steve Rolston for alerting me to the fact and letting me change my flight booking without penalty. Yeesh.
– Christopher
There are no hotels in San Diego–we’re all doomed. I booked on the wrong week. Heh.
Thank you to Steve Rolston for alerting me to the fact and letting me change my flight booking without penalty. Yeesh.
– Christopher
If you head over to The Comics Reporter today, you’ll see Tom Spurgeon list six problems facing the comics industry, at the moment. Not to steal his thunder or anything (it’s a good list), but except for the syndicated comics concern all of his points are cycling through my brain at least 2 or 3 times a week. The DM/Superhero Retail concerns more than the others, admittedly, but the future of the North American Manga Market and the “Loss of the Professional Class” are both high on my list of comics-related worries. Usually I treat those wories with comics-related Gin & Tonics.
Tom does a great job of summarising everything though, and I particularly wanted to talk about “The Loss of the Professional Class”. Take it away, Tom:
“I’m becoming more and more of the mind that the recent surge in business for many comics industries has for the first time in the medium’s history not had an identifiable, corresponding impact on the fortunes of comics creators. In previous decades comics rates went up when the business was booming… Now, despite the opening of new markets for new creators and the obvious relative health of the direct market when compared to five years ago, the stories about people receiving corresponding remuneration generally relate to opportunities seized outside of comics, not within it. In fact, there’s some initial evidence that a few of the new models even when they’re working full-bore may offer up rewards more of the struggling artist rather than the successful artist variety.”
– Tom Spurgeon, Comics Reporter
I just realised that’s a great tag to go after Tom’s name. Neat. As to Tom’s point… well… yes and no.
I have a number of friends who are young comics professionals, and looking at their carreers now, as opposed to what might have faced them 5, 10, or even 15 years ago, it’s pretty easy to see that there has been a significant, quantifiable increase in the dollars going into comics creator pockets. It’s still about as much as getting a real job as opposed to Todd McFarlane Wealthy, but it is possible to earn (rather than eak-out) a living in the new world of graphic novel publishing. Of course, it all depends on the deal you sign. $10,000 for a Tokyopop GN that’s effectively work-for-hire with a few sales incentives thrown in? Seeing as I’ve lived on $10,000 a year I know it’s possible, I just don’t want to do it. But there are people and they are getting better, fairer deals, and in some cases a pretty stupendous advance (we’ve all heard those names floated around, no need to go into them here).
Let’s look at Jeff Smith and his series Bone. Jeff Smith built his massive success on his and his wife Vijaya’s backs. It was a pretty brutal slog, in retrospect, with Jeff not only illustrating 140 pages of comics a year for 10 years, but also running the company that published those comics and doing 10-15 conventions per year on top of that. When the Scholastic deal came around, and let’s not forget that both Bone and Cartoon Books were successful at this point, that money was a reward for 10 years of very hard work. But could anyone, at this point, go the Bone route? My money’s on ‘no’.
But we’re also at a point where no one has to. The Mouse Guard guy is hitting a bunch of conventions, but he’s not the one lugging cases of his books (I hope), he’s got a publisher for that. Kean Soo’s Jellaby will be coming out from Hyperion Books next year, a young-readers graphic novel aimed squarely at the Bone-reading audience, and while mainstream authors are always encouraged to do promotions and press for their work (and I will be roping Keaner into a number of “personal appearances”) he’s got a team of people out there getting Jellaby in front of reviewers, into bookstores, onto book clubs, and into the hands of its intended audience. Which is gonna be hell for him, he’s so hands on. 🙂
The real reason that I’m not entirely worried about “The Loss of the Professional Class”? It’s a secret I probably shouldn’t spill on my blog, but… Alright, here goes: Judy Hansen, of Hansen Literary Agency [Edit: I had the name of the agency wrong, earlier, apologies to all involved]. Judy Hansen is Scott McCloud’s agent, and got him out of the deal with DC and into Harper Collins’s warm embrace. Scott set Judy up with Flight, and moved them from Image’s money-on-the-back-end deal to Random House, where… I don’t know how private those details are. Let’s say everyone involved is currently much happier with that situation, except possibly Image? Anyway. Judy also represents a ton of individual Flight Anthology creators, including Kazu Kibuishi (Scholastic), Hope Larson (ginee soo books/S&S), and the afformentioned Kean Soo (Hyperion). Her name most recently came up when it was announced that Svetlana Chmakova has signed with Yen Press (a division of Hachette) for her post-Tokyopop graphic novel series, negotiated by Ms. Hansen. Judy Hansen is known as an extremely tough negotiator for her comics clients (coming out of the collapse of Kitchen Sink publishing and seeing too many artists treated like commodity), and it’s a matter of public record (scroll through the archives at Publisher’s Weekly) that her clients are generally happy with the deals she secures for them.
I can’t speak, from the creative side, to the artists not represented by Judy Hansen, but despite her gruff reputation (she once told someone to stop talking to me because they had somewhere more important to be, all the while never making eye contact with me) I have quite a bit of hope for the economic feasibility of being a graphic novelist thanks to her. My fears are still there, but assuaged.
I honestly think that as graphic novels (not even as a category (although that’s nice), but individual gn’s) continue to hit with solid sales and critical acclaim, more agents, editorial staff, and publishers will become educated enough to really understand the medium, its unique creative and fiscal concerns, and things will settle in (upwards) accordingly. I wouldn’t trust a publisher, entrenched in either the direct market or out in ‘the real world’, who tells you there’s no money to be made in the publishing side, that it’s all in getting the work optioned for other-media exploitation. If the work hits (and if the publisher does the work so that it has the potential to hit) then creators should get paid for the sales of the book, it’s that simple. On that count, Tom Spurgeon is 100% correct, and the deals have got to get a hell of a lot better for creator-owned material (and creators really have to get lawyers and/or agents to look over those contracts before they sign them…!). But there are good deals out there right now, contracts to pattern yours after and a value being placed on creative work that’s equivilent to a living wage. It’s really up to the people with the power–the creative people–to seize on it.
– Christopher
P.S.: The future of the U.S. manga market is that either the tastes of the audience will age and the material being imported will do the same (like JAPAN), or it won’t, and we’ll be stuck with a nation of hardcore fucking nerds, lusting after MOE 12 year olds and deeply enjoying material for children (like AMERICA). Either way, you know, there’ll be an absolute avalanche of material to choose from, and so the market will remain healthy. It’d take a new Pearl Harbor for North America to turn away from Japanese culture in the fashion necessary for the market to collapse.
The following books are scheduled to ship to The Beguiling in Toronto, Canada, on Wednesday June 6th:
APR073799 30 DAYS OF NIGHT EBEN & STELLA #2 3.99
MAR071833 ALIEN PIG FARM #2 (OF 4) (MR) 2.99
DEC060035 ALIENS VS PREDATOR OMNIBUS VOL 1 TP (C: 0-1-2) 24.95
APR070185 ALL NEW ATOM #12 2.99
APR074098 ALTER EGO #69 (C: 0-1-2) 6.95
MAR073795 ANGEL SANCTUARY VOL 20 GN (C: 1-0-0) 9.99
MAR073756 ARANZI MACHINE GUN VOL 1 TP (C: 0-1-2) 9.95
MAR073151 ARCHIES CAMP TALES VOL 1 TP 7.49
APR074171 ART OF AL RIO VOL 1 TP (O/A) (MR) (C: 1-0-0) 9.95
APR073377 ART OF REBOOT HC 23.99
APR072292 AVENGERS INITIATIVE #3 CWI 2.99
MAR070175 BATMAN TURNING POINTS TP 14.99
FEB073328 BATTLESTAR GALACTICA #10 2.99
MAR073335 BATTLESTAR GALACTICA CYLON APOCALYPSE #4 3.50
FEB073329 BATTLESTAR GALACTICA SEGOVIA VIRGIN CVR INCV #10 2.99
MAR073712 BECK MONGOLIAN CHOP SQUAD VOL 8 GN (OF 19) (MR) 9.99
MAR073158 BETTY & VERONICA #227 2.25
APR070188 BIRDS OF PREY #107 2.99
APR073708 BLACK DIAMOND DETECTIVE AGENCY SC 16.95
APR073421 BLACK SUMMER #0 (OF 7) (MR) 0.99
APR073423 BLACK SUMMER INCV #0 (OF 7) (NET) (MR) (C: 0-0-1) 6.00
APR073422 BLACK SUMMER WRAP CVR #0 (OF 7) (MR) 0.99
MAR073796 BOYS OVER FLOWERS VOL 24 TP (C: 1-0-0) 9.99
MAR073586 BREATHE CVR A #2 (OF 4) (C: 0-1-2) 2.99
MAR073744 BRUSH STROKES WITH GREATNESS LIFE & ART OF JOE SIN 17.95
MAR073336 BSG CYLON APOCALYPSE GOLDEN VIRGIN CVR INCV #4 3.50
APR070029 BUFFY THE VAMPIRE SLAYER #4 2.99
APR072371 BULLET POINTS TP 13.99
APR074195 CAN ROCK & ROLL SAVE THE WORLD ILL HIST OF MUSIC & 24.95
MAR070178 CATWOMAN WHEN IN ROME TP 12.99
APR072369 CIVIL WAR IRON MAN TP 11.99
APR072370 CIVIL WAR MARVEL UNIVERSE TP 11.99
FEB073453 COMICS JOURNAL #283 9.95
MAR073528 COMPLETELY DOOMED TP 19.99
APR070180 COUNTDOWN 47 2.99
APR070244 DANGER GIRL BODY SHOTS #3 (OF 4) 2.99
APR072296 DAREDEVIL BATTLIN JACK MURDOCK #1 (OF 4) 3.99
APR072272 DARK TOWER GUNSLINGER BORN #5 (OF 7) 3.99
APR072274 DARK TOWER GUNSLINGER BORN JAE LEE SKETCH VAR #5 ( 3.99
APR072273 DARK TOWER GUNSLINGER BORN LAND VAR #5 (OF 7) 3.99
JAN071957 DARKNESS LEVEL 4 DALE KEOWN CVR A 2.99
JAN071958 DARKNESS LEVEL 4 STJEPAN SEJIC CVR B 2.99
MAR073678 DEATH AND THE MAN WHO WOULD NOT DIE #1 (OF 4) 2.99
APR070161 DETECTIVE COMICS #833 2.99
MAR073647 DOCTOR WHO THE FLOOD TP (C: 0-1-2) 26.50
APR073607 DRAFTED PREVIEW 0.99
MAR073896 DUNGEON JUNE 2007 #148 (C: 0-1-2) 7.99
APR071865 DYNAMO 5 #4 3.50
APR072379 ESSENTIAL SILVER SURFER VOL 2 TP 16.99
FEB073250 EUREKA SEVEN VOL 5 GN (C: 1-0-0) 9.99
MAR073413 EXIT WOUNDS HC (MR) 19.95
APR070268 EXTERMINATORS #18 (MR) 2.99
APR072373 FANTASTIC FOUR INHUMANS TP 19.99
APR070011 FEAR AGENT LAST GOODBYE #1 2.99
APR070012 FEAR AGENT LAST GOODBYE 10 CVR B COPY INCV 2.99
APR070013 FEAR AGENT LAST GOODBYE 20 CVR C COPY INCV 2.99
DEC063613 FLARE ADVENTURES COVER A #19 (NOTE PRICE) 4.50
DEC063615 FLARE ADVENTURES COVER B #19 (NOTE PRICE) 4.50
MAR073428 FUN NEVER STOPS ANTHOLOGY OF COMIC ART 1991-2006 S 16.95
MAR070073 GHOST IN THE SHELL 1.5 HUMAN ERROR PROCESSOR #8 (O 2.99
APR072300 GHOST RIDER TRAIL OF TEARS #5 (OF 6) 2.99
APR073608 GI JOE AMERICAS ELITE #24 3.50
MAR070241 GO GO HEAVEN VOL 2 (C: 1-0-0) 9.99
APR073694 HOUSE GN 12.95
MAY053361 HTDM CREATING STORIES (C: 0-1-2) 19.99
APR072299 HULK AND POWER PACK #4 (OF 4) 2.99
MAR073437 I SHALL DESTROY ALL THE CIVILIZED PLANETS SC 19.95
MAR073822 INU YASHA ANI MANGA VOL 21 GN (C: 1-0-0) 11.99
FEB071908 INVINCIBLE #42 (NOTE PRICE) 1.99
MAR072088 IRON MAN #18 CWI 2.99
APR072312 IRREDEEMABLE ANT-MAN #9 2.99
MAR070274 JACK OF FABLES #11 (MR) 2.99
APR070207 JONAH HEX #20 2.99
APR070225 JUSTICE LEAGUE UNLIMITED #34 2.25
APR073749 KEEPERS OF THE MASER VOL 7 YOUNG QUEEN HC (MR) (C: 14.95
MAR073823 LAW OF UEKI VOL 6 TP (C: 1-0-0) 9.99
DEC063487 LONE RANGER #6 2.99
DEC063488 LONE RANGER VIRGIN CVR INCV #6 2.99
APR072327 LONERS #3 (OF 6) 2.99
APR070230 LOONEY TUNES #151 2.25
MAR073303 LUCKY LUKE MA DALTON TP (C: 0-1-2) 9.99
APR070232 MAD MAGAZINE #479 3.99
MAR070253 MAN CALLED KEV TP (MR) 14.99
APR072316 MARVEL ADVENTURES SPIDER-MAN #28 2.99
APR072319 MARVEL ZOMBIES ARMY OF DARKNESS #4 (OF 5) 2.99
APR070245 MIDNIGHTER #8 2.99
FEB070093 MPD PSYCHO VOL 1 TP (MR) (C: 1-1-3) 10.95
APR072320 MS MARVEL #16 CWI 2.99
MAR072096 MYSTIC ARCANA BOOK OF MARVEL MAGIC 3.99
APR072323 NEW WARRIORS #1 CWI 2.99
APR070166 NIGHTWING #133 2.99
MAR073824 O PARTS HUNTER VOL 4 TP (C: 1-0-0) 9.99
APR073387 OKKO CYCLE OF WATER #3 (OF 4) (MR) 3.95
FEB070100 OLD BOY VOL 6 TP (MR) (C: 1-1-3) 12.95
APR072325 OMEGA FLIGHT #3 CWI (OF 5) 2.99
APR074123 OTAKU USA MAGAZINE AUG 2007 (C: 0-1-2) 9.99
APR070208 OUTSIDERS #48 2.99
MAR070245 PIECES OF A SPIRAL VOL 8 (C: 1-0-0) 9.99
APR074122 PRISM COMICS LGBT GUIDE TO COMICS MAG 2007 (MR) (C 5.95
MAR073401 PS238 #23 2.99
APR072346 PUNISHER #48 (MR) 2.99
FEB073298 QUEEN MARGOT VOL 2 BLOODY WEDDING GN 13.95
MAR073343 RAISE THE DEAD #3 3.50
APR071857 RIDE VOL 1 TP NEW PTG (C: 0-1-2) 12.99
MAR073167 SABRINA VOL 2 #85 2.25
FEB073837 SADHU #8 2.99
APR070271 SCALPED #6 (MR) 2.99
APR073744 SEEKERS #1 (O/A) 2.99
APR072355 SEVENTH SHRINE TP 11.99
MAR073693 SHAUN THE SHEEP COMIC #3 (C: 0-1-2) 5.99
MAR073775 SHONEN JUMP JULY 07 #55 (C: 1-0-0) 4.99
MAR073252 SIMPSONS SUMMER SHINDIG #1 4.99
JAN070075 SOCK MONKEY THE INCHES INCIDENT #4 (OF 4) 2.99
APR074201 SOON I WILL BE INVINCIBLE HC (C: 0-1-2) 22.95
JAN071944 SPAWN #168 2.95
APR072286 SPIDER-MAN FAMILY #3 4.99
APR072288 SPIDER-MAN LOVES MARY JANE #19 2.99
JAN073266 SPIDER-MAN SINISTER 6 ELECTRO MED STATUE (C: 1-1-4 85.00
MAR073591 STARSHIP TROOPERS #0 EXPO EXCLUSIVE ED (C: 0-1-2) 5.00
DEC063755 STARSHIP TROOPERS DAMAGED JUSTICE ENJETI CVR A #4 3.50
DEC063756 STARSHIP TROOPERS DAMAGED JUSTICE REYES CVR B #4 ( 3.50
FEB073634 STARSHIP TROOPERS ONGOING CVR A #1 3.50
FEB073635 STARSHIP TROOPERS ONGOING CVR B #1 3.50
MAR071821 STRANGE EMBRACE #1 (OF 8) (MR) 2.99
JAN071945 STRANGE GIRL #17 3.50
APR070177 SUPERGIRL #18 2.99
APR073292 SUPERIOR SHOWCASE #2 (MR) 2.95
MAR070183 SUPERMAN #663 2.99
APR070254 SUPERNATURAL ORIGINS #2 2.99
OCT061847 SUPERPATRIOT WAR ON TERROR #4 (OF 4) (RES) 2.99
APR073701 THREE PARADOXES GN (RES) 14.95
MAR073506 TRANSFORMERS GRTST BATTLES OPTIMUS PRIME MEGATRON 19.99
APR073767 TRANSFORMERS MOVIE ADAPTATION #1 (OF 4) 3.99
APR073774 TRANSFORMERS MOVIE PREQUEL TP 19.99
APR073773 TRANSFORMERS MOVIE TP 17.99
APR073782 TRANSFORMERS SPOTLIGHT TP 19.99
FEB073300 TRUTH SERUM VOL 1 TP (O/A) (MR) 18.00
APR072341 UNCANNY X-MEN #487 2.99
JAN074073 VIDEO WATCHDOG #131 (C: 0-1-2) 7.95
MAR073688 WALLACE AND GROMIT PLOTS IN SPACE SC (C: 0-1-2) 12.95
APR071883 WARD O/T STATE #2 (OF 3) 3.50
APR073515 WARHAMMER 40K DAMNATION CRUSADE PX VAR CVR #2 2.99
APR070250 WELCOME TO TRANQUILITY #7 2.99
MAR073838 WINTER DEMON VOL 2 GN (MR) 12.95
MAR073658 WIPE THAT CLOCK OFF YOUR FACE HC (C: 0-1-2) 29.95
FEB071923 WITCHBLADE PUNISHER 3.99
MAR071873 WITCHBLADE TAKERU MANGA #4 2.99
MAR073747 WORKING METHODS COMIC CREATORS STORYTELLING PROCES 21.95
FEB070102 XS HYBRID TP (C: 1-1-3) 10.95
APR073915 YOUNG BOTTOMS IN LOVE GN (MR) 22.00
MAR073825 ZATCH BELL VOL 13 GN (C: 1-0-0) 9.99
I’m gonna be an uncle! Twice! My brother knocked-up his wife (Why yes, I am all class, how did you know?) and soon there will be a little baby Butcher running around. A little Ms. Butcher, which makes my mom extremely happy and takes the pressure off of me. My Niece is due sometime at the end of September, which is good because her birthday will not be overshadowed by mine… it will be difficult to get her any media attention though, because the Toronto International Film Festival just sucks up all the available media during that period. Did I mention I only think it terms of media coverage now? I do. My birthday is good, because it’s 2 weeks before San Diego, and can figure into pre-show coverage. I can’t explain it. MEANWHILE! I’m going to be an uncle again, because my [erstwhile/beautiful/talented] husband’s brother knocked up his girlfriend and… baby #2! Also a girl! But baby Woodrow is currently scheduled to outrace baby Butcher, and will be arriving in late July. Which conflicts with San Diego, so… I dunno. Hopefully they can hold off until August or the launch won’t get any coverage at all.
Also: HOLY SHIT. If you open today’s copy of PREVIEWS, you might notice a certain book in the Tokyopop section called I.N.V.U. VOLUME 4. Why is this so HOLY-SHIT worthy? Because I.N.V.U. Volume 3? That book shipped in July 2003. It will have been more than 4 years between volumes. You think your paltry 14 months between All-Star Batman’s is impressive? I’ve been waiting to find out what happens next in a glorified soap opera for 14 year old girls for more than 4 years. And not like passively waiting either. Every 2 weeks I get “Hey, what ever happened to INVU #4?” which is like a fresh dagger in my heart. The thing is, how do I order it? Are there that many rabid INVU fans desperate for volume 4, or has everyone moved on to bigger, better, bolder Manwha? I guess we’ll find out.
Speaking of Previews, I got so caught up in real life that I forgot to get the last set of D&Q submissions online… That’ll have to be rectified shortly.
We had a very good time last night at the first ever Beguiling Comics Industry Night. Thanks to everyone who came out and socialised, and to surprise guest attendee Darwyn Cooke who was in town being interviewed for the upcoming DC: THE NEW FRONTIER animated DVD. No, he hasn’t seen any footage from it yet. The Comics Industry Night goes down the last Wednesday of every month here in Toronto, hit up The Beguiling mailing list at http://www.beguiling.com for the skinny.
See you again soon.
Edit to add: Another short, random observation! Over at ComicsWorthReading, Johanna caught wind of the news that Wendy & Richard Pini, creators of Elfquest, and DC Comics, the most recent publishers of Elfquest, have parted ways. No one seems to have commented on the idea that the big Elfquest deal went down right around the time that DC was rapidly trying to increase their bookstore presence. Elfquest was acquired about a year before DC made it’s deals with Titan and Humanoids, so far as I can tell, with the first original Elfquest graphic novel, Humanoids, Titan, and the entire CMX line launching within a few months of one another in summer/fall 2004. That bookstore push was both ill-considered and a failure, and aside from CMX (which has been completely rebranded and relaunched since the initial push), Elfquest was sort of the vestigal tail from that period, now finally fallen off. While I don’t personally think much of the viability of the brand (a book called Elfquest couldn’t make an impression in the era of LORD OF THE RINGS?) there are still fans, and the books do turn at least once a year for us, so that’s… something. Anyway, it’s interesting to see DC reconsidering their bookstore presence, elves replaced with minxes and wierd euro-sci-fi replaced with… Identity Crisis.
– Christopher
Earlier this year, I edited my second comic book (and third project) ever: Comics Festival! 2007. Fulfilling the dual duties of promoting the Toronto Comic Arts Festival and exposing the world to a wealth of talented Canadian Cartoonists, it featured over 20 comics strips from across the country and was quite well-received by all who managed to find a copy at a comic shop on free comic book day. But when the submissions started coming in earlier this year, I got cold feet on one of them, fearing the sort of insane and unreasonable reprisal that follows any comic store retailer being upset about things, let alone things that they are paying to give away for free. What was I so afraid of? Cock, or rather the reaction to cock. The cock of…
It’s J. Bone’s Jett Vector, a sexy intergalactic policeman in a leather pouch and spacefaring go-go boots. Now, this was before the Citizen Steele cocktastrophe, let alone slutty statues and tentacle porn, and hindsight is 20/20 and all that, but here’s the story of my own personal fear of cock.
J. Bone is an amazingly talented gay comics artist who’s worked on series including Jingle Belle, DC The New Frontier, and The Spirit. He contributed an awesome one page strip to our first Comics Festival in 2005 (and if you click here you can read it!), and so when 2007 rolled around, I knew I wanted him in the book and he was invited (albeit through his buddy and co-artist on The Spirit Darwyn Cooke) to participate. He turned around a two-page strip in no-time flat, and it was… is… great. You can actually check it out at J.’s blog, Bonesmen. He submitted it to me with a bit of a caveat; having shown the strip to his friends they wondered if it was maybe a little racy for an all-ages book, and what did I think? So I looked at it, and liked it, and then sat and thought about it. Which was a mistake.
Some background: Free Comic Book Day? WROUGHT WITH CONTROVERSY. I’ve no idea why the act of giving comic books away for free has caused so much fucking turmoil, but it totally has, and as the editor of a book being distributed on FCBD, I was very much aware of that…
2004: A child is distributed a mature-readers comic at a Georgia comic book store. It features non-sexual nudity (an excerpt from the recently-released “The Salon” by Nick Bertozzi) and the child’s parent, who apparently has a history of this sort of behaviour, freaks out and calls the cops/the D.A./anyone who’ll listen. This is now known as “The Gordon Lee Case” and the CBLDF is fighting it in court right now. You can help out at http://cbldf.org.
2005: We release our first Comics Festival, and two weeks later get an angry phone call charging me, Peter, the store, and TCAF with being Anti-Semites. Seriously. The reasoning is that we printed Leslie Stein’s comic strip in Comics Festival, wherin the author (Jewish) discusses her physical appearance (see strip here). We thought we’d get flak for Darwyn Cooke having Superman knock-off a local television personality in that issue, not for an autobio comic. Nevertheless, we hold our ground defending Lauren’s right to comment on her apperance and heritage, and nothing major comes of it, but being shouted at and called an anti-semite on the phone? Stays with you.
2005: In a book marked all-ages, a charming “Paul” short story by Michel Rabagliati features a young boy’s first encounter with a naked-lady calendar in a restroom. He is depicted peeing and being embarrassed by the calendar. You really don’t see anything, but retailers screamed bloody murder at the ‘all ages’ tag on something that wasn’t all-ages in… well, Georgia I guess.
2006: There was some cocktastrophe last year too, I can’t remember what it was. I know that the “all-ages” book BLUFF featured an advertisement with bare-breasts in it (that made retailers v. unhappy)… But yeah. Sorry. Anyway.
So, going into publishing the book for 2007? I was a little cockshy about the strip. We’d solicited the book as 13+, made the contents as widely-known as possible, and generally tried to be honest about everything. But I honestly wasn’t sure if the strip skirted into mature-readers territory by virtue of the costume and context of the story… or not. So, and I’m not proud of this, I asked J. if he wanted to cover-up Jett a little more. Maybe a pair of bicycle shorts, or a less-prominent bulge? “If not, I understand, and we’ll run the strip as is and hope for the best,” said I. But I did ask him to change his work. J. said that he’d rather not run the strip if it meant altering it, and I started to feel shittier and shittier about the whole thing… until the book’s designer Chip Zdarsky had a brilliant idea.
“Let Diamond handle it.”
2007 is the first year that Diamond made participating Free Comic Book Day publishers submit their books, in PDF form, ahead of time. I’m honestly not sure why… they don’t seem to have done much with them. But Chip had a good idea. Submit the strip, and if Diamond didn’t say anything about it being ‘inappopriate’ in an ‘all ages’ book (really “Teen” but…) then we’re good to go! J. thought this was a good idea too, and I felt much better knowing that I wasn’t forced to censor or silence a gay creator out of fear of overreaction from the fan and retail community. Did I mention all of this made me sick to my stomach? It did. Anyway. We submitted the book. Heard nothing back. Sent it to press. Diamond got copies. Retailers got copies. No one said anything… until!
CONTROVERSY OVER PHALLUSES AND VAGINAS IN FREE COMIC BOOK DAY BOOKS!
Luckily though, it wasn’t our book. 🙂
Apparently, Image Comics’ Wolfman by Robert Kirkman featured a back-up story with another Kirkman character named “Brit” and the end of the story features a panel with a bunch of dildoes in it. And then? If you flip the back cover of the book upside-down, and squint, and think dirty thoughts, a picture of a vagina might appear. Seriously. This happened and it sent people into a rage. It was fucking stupid, but then so is the idea that seeing an illustration of a flacid penis might seriously damage a little boy forever, and that one’s in court. So yeah, there was tons and tons of controversy this year… Rich Johnston covered a bunch of it in his Lying in the Gutters column, go check it out.
But not our book. I mean, sure, Diamond sent out a warning to retailers that stated that Comics Festival! 2007 (among 20 other titles or so) had material some retailers might not want to distribute to kids, but they didn’t say why. Then, when Kevin Melrose at Blog @ Newsarama linked to the Jett Vector story at J. Bone’s blog, the first comment on the piece was from a “Christian Illustrator” who described the two page story as being inspired by “gay porn”. But he’s a prick, so who cares?
In the end, we had one of the highest-selling “Silver” level free comic book day books, made tens of thousands of comic fans new and old happy, and everything went off without a hitch. It’s now just-about a month after the event, and no one said shit, apparently too distracted by the cocks, tits, and tentacles present elsewhere on the internet. Which means that my own fear of cock was ultimately unfounded.
If you go check the original “Afraid of Cock” post, you can see Darwyn Cooke in the comments section giving me shit about railing on Don MacPherson when I had come very close to censoring an artist for similar reasons. Why was I giving Don shit? Well, mostly for the yaoi comment actually, and for not knowing what an erect penis in spandex looks like… but I digress. I was giving all the “men” who were “creeped out” by the original image shit because I’d been there, if to a lesser degree. I had 20 other artists in Comics Festival, 1000 retailers who ordered the book, and 25,000 fans who might take objection, and under that pressure I strove for a compromise rather than standing 100% behind an artist who I had personally invited to participate. Put simply: I totally fucked up, and looking back, I see that. All I can say is I’m a convert… for cock. If people are gonna see it even when it isn’t there, then by fuck, lets put it out there in future.
I’ve already apologised to J. in private and we’re cool, more or less, but I did want to take the opportunity here to apologise again to J. for not standing up for a strip I enjoyed, by a fabulously talented artist. If anything, I’ve posted this here not only to air out the skeletons in my own closet, but also to try and draw some attention to J.’s work, to Jett Vector in particular, and maybe let prospective publishers know that there really isn’t anything wrong with this material. It’s sexy, yeah, but it ain’t slutty (see: Marvel Comics, DC Comics). It can be tough dealing with a property that skirts the line, particularly the scary male sexuality line, but it can be done and I’d hope that anyone reading there would trust J. Bone to be the guy to know the difference. I didn’t at first, but believe me, I’ve seen the light. Hopefully some smart editor out there will too, and we’ll all get more Jett Vector in future.
– Christopher
More at http://radiomaru.com/.
Canadians love that Tim Horton fellow.
I had to post a better picture than the last one of Jamie, just so he’d speak to me again.
Svetlana Chmakova, signing at The Beguiling table on Saturday. She had a huge line.
Since Kai was good enough to make a post on my blog, and since I didn’t fuck his mother in return, I’ve instead decided to post this picture. Also, the following pictures were taken by Kai:
Awwww! That’s ADORABLE.
– Chris
Kai and Jason are so cool. i really should have “blogged” about them sooner. I also should not have left my laptop unattended. One of my favorite movies is Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, but i wish that Kai and Jason had played the main roles. it would have been better that way. I also think Backdraft would have been better if Kai and Jason played all the roles in it
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