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I'm sorry, but I honestly can't tell you until the book is announced. All I can say is that the publisher has been lined up, the art team is working on it right now, and I hope to launch the book in very early 2012.
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I won't give too much away, but I'm writing a graphic novel set in the world of professional wrestling in the 1970s and 1980s loosely based upon the life of Andre the Giant. I have an artist lined up and we will hopefully start pitching to publishers by the end of the year. If you read my self-published comic, Matinee Eclectica, you'll be happy to know that one of the artists in that book will be drawing the graphic novel--if we can get picked up.
The book is actually going to be very personal for me and will be much deeper than it sounds based on the premise. It should be an emotional roller-coaster with a lot of real heart. -
I'm really not part of the site any more now that I am spending almost all of my free time focusing on my writing. We have not officially parted ways, but I haven't written any reviews since March and I don't have any plans in the coming months to contribute anything new to the site. I had a great time being part of the group and I still keep in contact with the crew through Twitter, but otherwise I am no longer connected to them.
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The first movie I remember seeing without adult supervision would've been The Sandlot. I went with some friends from school and we were "supervised" by one of them's cousin.
The first concert I went to without an adult would've been Ozzfest 1999 when I was 16. -
As much as I enjoyed my time writing comic book reviews, after my years my heart really wasn't in it anymore. The hours I spent writing reviews started to feel like a chore and I was starting to dread it week after week. The way I thought about it, why bother writing about comics when I could be writing comics?
The other issue is that I started making a lot contacts in the industry and becoming friends with a lot of the creators I had been reviewing. It became a conflict of interest for me as a writer to continue reviewing the books of people that I had regular contact with or hoped to work with some day.
I could easily have continued to use my comic book reviews to make more contacts and to further my career, but that would be terribly unethical. I've seen other reviewers do it and I want no part of that. You can't be objective about a comic if you are schmoozing the creators on the side to further your own dreams of being a creator. -
I really haven't read that many books on writing, at least not recently. I read a lot of books on composition in college, but mostly in the academic sense as I wasn't considering writing fiction until after I graduated.
I've read a few books on writing comics, but the only one that I found was Alan Moore's "Writing for Comics." Moore is the greatest storyteller in the history of comics and the book is a great insight on his thought processes. I highly recommend that.
Beyond that, i just recommend studying storytelling in all forms. Whenever you find yourself enjoying a piece of fiction, whether it be a comic/movie/novel/etc, look at how it plays with the standard 3 act structure, try to figure out why you care about the characters, etc. The best way to study writing is to read, read, read, read. -
Absolutely! I didn't get back into comics until I was in college at which time I was dating my then-girlfriend/now-wife. Since then, I've tried getting her to read hundreds of comics. She hasn't been too keen on the superhero stuff (the first superhero book I got her to try was DC's Identity Crisis), but she has really dug a lot of the Vertigo and Indie books that I've recommended, like Y: The Last Man, Fables, etc. Since then, she has branched out and found her own interests in comics and now even recommends them to others--she is especially into the books from Top Shelf, like Jeffrey Brown's memoirs, Owly, etc.
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I would love to own a complete set of the most important Batman comics--Detective Comics #27, Batman #1, Detective Comics #38, Detective Comics #359, etc etc etc. Obviously, that isn't going to happen.
If I had to go with something "plausaible," I'd say the complete Wolfman/Perez run on Teen Titans. For a while my big wish list was to own the entire original run of Marvel's "A Man Called Nova" series from the 70s, but I completed that last year. -
Honestly, I'm not a huge fan of digital comics. During my 4+ years as a comic book reviewer, I've read tons of them, but I never really got the hang of it. I like the novelty of holding a printed comic and, honestly, I can only read a digital comic for so long before I start getting a headache.
I suppose if I had read them on an iPad or similar tablet as opposed to a laptop or desktop I might feel differently, but until then, I'm strictly a hardcopy comic reader! -
Since DC is finally doing a New Teen Titans Omnibus, I'd love to see a Nova Omnibus. The "Man Called Nova" series from the 70s is one of my favorite runs of all time and is the perfect length for the omnibus format. For extras, it'd be great to have some commentary from Marv Wolfman on the creation of the character and I'd love to see the black-and-whites of the early pages. Joe Sinnott's inks were crazy good on top of John Buscema's pencils!
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Art is tremendously important. Even though I am a writer, I find myself following artists from book-to-book more than I do writers. I've picked up comics I never would have otherwise just because folks like Stegman, Samnee, Breitweiser, Igle, and Asrar are on them. On the flipside, if a comic has really bad art but good writing, I'm more likely to drop it than I am a very pretty book with bad writing. That's why I don't pick up Uncanny X-Men any more. I just can't forgive Greg Land's artwork!
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1. Since Amanda Conner isn't doing anything for DC right now, I'll have to say RB Silva. His work on Jimmy Olson was extremely clean with great designs and superb storytelling. It was a nearly flawless comic.
2. This was a tough one,but I'm going to go with Ryan Stegman just barely edging out Chris Samnee. Stegman has shown more growth in the last two years than any other artist in the industry. He, along with Samnee and Gabriel Hardman, are Marvel's dominant artists of the future.
3. For Image, I'm going to say Joe Eisma. He has this great flair for making things look natural without resorting to extreme photorealism. That makes Morning Glories one of the most amazing comics on the stands.
4. For my indie pick, I'm going with Robert Atkins, the lead artist on IDW's GI Joe. His work on the series is the perfect mix of realism and a more fantastic flair that is perfectly in line with the tone of IDW's take on the franchise. -
Yes, they did. Thanks for notcing my screw-up! Anyway, here are my FIVE choices:
1. The Killing Joke (see previous tweet)
2. Elephantmen: War Toys (see previous tweet)
3. Marian Churchland's Beast - A brilliant debut original graphic novel from amazing artist Marian Churchland that is a thoughtful look at the mind of an artist with absolutely breathtaking art.
4. Every Preacher trade - Preacher is my favorite comic of all time and everyone needs to read it at least once. Even if it isn't your bag, you'll learn more about writing character interaction in one trade of Preacher than you would in the full runs of just about every other comic book combined.
5. Watchmen - I know that this is the easy answer, but Watchmen is even better than everyone says it is. There is a reason why this is the lynchpin of modern comics! -
If we are talking superheroes here, I'd have to go with The Killing Joke. The story is not only a major turning point for all four major characters (Joker, Batman, Commissioner Gordon, and Barbara Gordon), but it is one of the most psychologically gripping superhero stories ever told. I can't think of any other comic that so eloquently placed Batman's psyche on the same level as the Joker. Granted, there is the mysoginistc "women in refridgerators" aspect to the story, but I feel that DC has more than rectified all that with what they have done with Barbara Gordon since then. Plus, it is easily my favorite work that artist Brian Bolland has ever done, especially in the recent recolored version. As a cool sidenote, the comic was actually hand-lettered by Bolland and Richard Starkings merely "inked" the letters.
If we are looking outside of superheroes, I'd have to say Elephantmen: War Toys. This comic is a great introduction to the Elephantmen universe while standing on its own quite well. Plus it features the absolute best work of artist Justin "Moritat" Norman's career. -
I had no idea that Archie would be releasing a Mega Man comic. I might have to check that out! I'm always a little leary of comics based upon licensed properties, but every now and then I'll be surprised by one (like Udon's Street Fighter books). I'll definitely need to do some digging on this one!
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The problem with all of my favorite characters is that they've already been written so well that I'd be afraid to take up the reigns. There have been amazing stories with characters like Nova, Batman, Nightwing, Lex Luthor, etc. and I'm not sure I could compete.
That being said, I'd really like to take on Deathstroke the Terminator from DC. I feel like the complexities of the character have been ignored a lot over the last decade or so and I'd love to bring that back. -
While I think I'm better suited for mature themed comics, I like the idea of writing all ages comics and plan to pursue them as well. While things fell through during the contract stage, my first published work was nearly King of Cool, which would have been an all ages graphic novel.
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Absolutely! We can start an army of state-themed freedom fighters.
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Pecs? The 5th largest city in Hungary? Yeah, I heard he has a small weiner. The art looks damn good though.
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I struggle with the idea of writing for a living--I've been working at my "real job" since I got out of college, so it's hard to imagine myself doing anything else primarily.
However, I'd love to be writing full time by then. Hopefully I will have seen more than one volume of ASSUMPTION printed by then. Although I can't see myself writing superhero books right now, in five years, I'd like to have written something published by DC or Marvel--even if it is just a backup story or a short in an anthology. I think that these are pretty realistic goals, especially considering how far I've come so far.
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