§ Fine Art: My Old Friend Michael Gaydos Reminds Me of Existence undera new graphic novel by Gaydos (AKA, Jessica Jones) with a story by Gaydos Steven S. DeKnight (TV’s “Spartacus,” “Daredevil,” conan and Wastelanders: Wolverine In comics. It’s a horror story, and my guess at the synopsis is: The incident in a Texas detention camp for undocumented immigrants. The book has graphic design by Cindy Leong, typeface design by Toben Racicot, and editing by Allison O’Toole; Kate Sánchez served as cultural consultant and translator. The book was launched last week from Amazon’s Comixology Originals exclusive digital content series and is Gaydos’ FRIST original graphic novel.
Below, Deputy Sheriff Jess Delgado is tasked with moving the sole survivor of a mysterious attack on the Texas-Mexico border to Core Civil, a for-profit immigration detention center, The center is closing due to widespread protests. With only a handful of remaining detainees and guarded by a group of disgruntled guards, the detention center becomes a desperate battlefield when something otherworldly emerges from deep underground. Deputy Delgado must unite the guards and detainees – two groups who hate and fear each other – to survive the night or face the vengeance of what lurks. under.
Honestly, this is a great opening sequence. Plus, Comixology is still putting out comics!
§ Twice in two weeks, how lucky are you?
§ Obviously Zach Rabiroff Been working on an epic article about the history of Marvel in the Bill Jemas era. It will be published in Comics Journal #310, but TCJ.com has an excerpt: Bill Jemas’s Rashomon: Four Portraits from the Marvel Era. I can’t think of anything I’d like to read more of, so I’ll probably just buy this issue! Rabbirov talks to some of the lesser-known (but key) players of this era, e.g. Jenny Lee and Andrew Leeswhich paints a rather optimistic portrait of a rather crazy period:
Leith can speak freely now that he’s been out of the comics business for several years, working in the saner, more fulfilling field of metal recycling. He would have ended up like this 20 years ago if Axel Alonso hadn’t found him. … As long as we can make money, we can do anything. anything. As editor, she recalled Roosevelt’s instructions for the books she was responsible for: “We try something new, and we see if it works. If it doesn’t work, we change our minds. Then we can fix it. But [Jemas] Like, you learn things by trying things, and then if they don’t work, now you know. But you don’t stop doing something because you’re afraid it’s unprecedented or has never been done before.
…
Liss explained the logic: “I remember saying, look, my memory as a retailer is that a lot of Marvel books might sell, but they’re terrible. You don’t need 15 Midnight’s Children or whatever you Said name. No one cares. What you do is, you have a bunch of money and you’re diluting it because there are only so many buyers that you need to add, but there’s only so much money in circulation. So you have Marvel fans choosing not to buy Avengers and buy Midnight’s Children, but if you subtract half the X-Men books, more people will probably buy the core books. Complain to you, but if you got better people writing these books, you’d sell more of the best stuff (instead of diluting your brand) and you wouldn’t have to tell these huge crossover stories…pitch eight. This book is easier than launching 70 books and saying, ‘You have to buy this book.’
The roots of today’s direct market lie squarely in Marvel’s Jermaine era, and now it’s time to take a thorough look at it – although as has been pointed out many times, the rise of the Marvel Cinematic Universe ended experimentation with traditional IP , and it’s such a shame.
§ Jeff Smith Interviewed by PW about his Youth comic “Thorns”, Now reprinted:
I learned how to make suspenseful comics. I know what kind of humor works. Some of the reactions we would get in college – a lot of people would be like, “Oh, you did that striptease. How? That’s not funny. Now that I’ve read it, I realize the reason I thought they were bad is because when When I submitted them to newspaper syndicates to run them in the paper, I received the dreaded rejection letter: “This is stupid. This won’t work. Good luck. Try somewhere else. They let me I believed it was a stupid idea, but I knew it wasn’t a stupid idea. I believed in the characters more than the comics, so I decided, “Well, this isn’t the format for me.” Cutting off all attempts to sell it to newspapers, luckily, around the same time, a two- or three-page full-color comic, The Dark Knight, appeared in the weekend magazine section of my hometown college newspaper, The Columbus Dispatch. Return. This was 1986. I had never seen a newspaper talk about a comic book before! I looked at the artwork, it was different—a different style, a different way of coloring.
§ Milton Gripp Reveals the Secret Embracer Group latest financial report, For Dark Horse’s parent company, the future of video games is bleak…but comics are profitable?
Embracer sales fell 24% due to significant declines in PC/Console Games (down 34%) and Entertainment & Services (down 54%). These declines were attributed to tough competition and few new product launches. In the entertainment and services segment, sales of “Dark Horse” were seen as a revenue driver, with sales of “Berserker” and strong sales of “Avatar: The Last Airbender” behind Netflix’s live-action series and the exposure of material in webcomics Be dominant.
Dark Horse deserves credit for somehow managing to navigate a path through the decline of the video game industry without becoming a money black hole.
§ Also visited on ICv2 Graphix Co-Founder and Publisher David Thaler Follow North America’s largest comics publisher’s move to add comics:
This is mainly due to seeing the popularity of the manga. This was a type of comic that Scholastic wasn’t doing, and it felt like, well, why don’t we do it? It also comes from talking to librarians and parents whose kids are reading comics that they probably shouldn’t be reading because they’re so excited about the content and the artwork. This is difficult for librarians because they have to guide the appropriate age group to the appropriate books, and they can’t recommend older comics. Kids really need middle grade comics, and that’s where I think Scholastic can change the world because we only publish children’s books. We are very clear about the content we publish for different age groups. We were really strong in middle grade comics, so I thought, well, why don’t we do comics?
§ As long as we do this link, there will be a story every week titled 13 Best Adult Themed Graphic Novels This time it’s from “The Mary Sue.” 13 good comics. Show it to a friend.
§ The annual NCS (National Cartoonists Society) conference is in a few weeks and Broom-Hilda’s Russell Myers Has been inducted into the NCS Hall of Fame. .
Russell Myers will receive the Gold Key Award at the 78th annual Reuben Awards ceremony in San Diego on August 23. For 54 years, Miles independently wrote and drew the daily syndicated comic strip “Broom-Hilda.” In 2024, he was awarded the Guinness World Record for “Longest Daily Serialization of a Comic by a Single Author.”
§ CRIME BLOTTER, both involving the restoration of all things comic books. In Ormesville, Oregon, Local man accused of stealing $300,000 worth of comic books After he restores the comics sent to him, he then sells them online or at dealers:
According to the Linn County Sheriff’s Office, the 57-year-old man owns a business called “Hero Restoration” in Lebanon. Customers from Colorado, Connecticut, Michigan, Minnesota, Montana, New Jersey, New York, Pennsylvania, Texas and Washington state sent him comics for restoration. An Ormsville man filed with the Secretary of State’s Office to dissolve his company in 2023.
§ Meanwhile, in the exact opposite situation, the restorer Investment Grace Books wins $10 million in defamation lawsuit against CGC. The lawsuit has dragged on for eight years since the IGB filed it. Matt and Emily Meyers Sued CGC, claiming defamation due to comments made by CGC employees.
According to testimony in the case, the Meyers sent the restored comic book to CGC for grading. The lawsuit alleges that Matthew Nelson, the chief CGC grader, publicly challenged IGB’s claims of fraud during the restoration process in an online forum. The Meyers believed their submission was underachieving and filed a defamation lawsuit. The couple also claimed their company lost future business due to fraud concerns. CGC claimed Nielsen was representing himself, not the company. The jury disagreed and ruled in favor of the Meyers.
§ This weekend is…new york fan festivala massive event designed to be a sports comic convention. The New York Post has a preview, because only it can:
Why should comics lovers have all the fun? The first Fanatics Festival, a large-scale event known as the “Cartoon Expo of Sports,” will be held this weekend (August 16 to August 18) at the Javits Center. People who will be able to meet and get autographs from top athletes like Peyton and Eli Manning, Kevin Durant and Derek Jeter attended dozens of panels and purchased tons of merchandise for their favorites. Cheers, team.
There are some interesting numbers in the article: 50,000 sports fans are expected, and parent company Fanatics spent $10 million on various activities at the event, “including Tom Brady passing the football to a kid.” Kids’ ‘Kids Zone,'” a place to get your own WWE entrance, the 40-yard dash, and apparently Jay-Z’s $3 million pop-up entertainment for his 40/40 Club. That sounds like a lot of money, but the founder of Fanatic Michael Rubin Net worth $11 billion, so no tears shed.
Fanatics Fest will focus on trading cards (Fanatics owns Topps) and other collectibles. Of course there are many autograph shows and sports card shows every week in the United States; nationTrading Card Comic Con attracts 40,000 to 100,000 people. Still, I’ve often wondered if sports–the most popular thing on earth–could create an event like Comic-Con…and now we’ll find out! The Beat will be on hand to cover all the bumps and dashes.
§ On the other hand, we have this week’s top stories: Piney Woods Comic Con brings excitement to Lufkin Hobby Shop owner. Seeing a con through one man’s excitement is a great way to showcase the event, especially when his store is called The Chadderbox.
Chad Fischer, owner of Chadderbox Hobby Shop in Lufkin Mall, has been passionate about card games, Pokémon and comic book culture since he was a child.
What started as a YouTube channel dedicated to opening Pokémon card booster packs with Fisher-Price kids has grown into a full-fledged store specializing in comics, games, and fantasy.
Fisher was happy to see the same thing at Pinegrove Comic Con.
“There’s such a shortage of large events like this for the number of customers they have here looking for these types of events,” Fisher said.
§ I don’t know that I found this, but you probably know Brian Cunningham A long-time senior editor at DC, he is currently the editor-in-chief of Ghost Machine, but he also wrote and drew a mystery comic About finding a deer trapped in an exit. I think this is cool.
