House to Astonish Episode 121
I’ve got a cold but comics doesn’t stand still while people blow their noses, so we’re soldiering on with a fresh new episode of House to Astonish. This time round, we talk about the Comixology hack; Archie’s new CCO (and new writer); Boom!’s new director and their Big Trouble in Little China series; the IDW Cartoon Network crossover; the new writers of Thunderbolts; Gail Simone and Jim Calafiore’s Leaving Megalopolis moving to Dark Horse; Titan’s new Doctor Who ongoing series; Skottie Young’s Rocket Raccoon; the Stan & Sharon Sakai benefit auctions (which are here) and Eric Stephenson’s speech to ComicsPRO. We’ve also got reviews of Moon Knight, Evil Empire and The Auteur, and the Official Handbook of the Official Handbook of the Marvel Universe is neither swings nor roundabouts. All this plus Satanism With Sabrina, rapper-hunting robots and the Man of a Thousand Handles.
The podcast is here, or here on Mixcloud, or available via the embedded player below. Let us know what you think, either in the comments below, on Twitter, via email or on our Facebook fan page.
And hey, spring is coming in – what better way to mark that than with a House to Astonish t-shirt from our Spring Collection? It’s the same as our Winter Collection but please don’t tell anyone.
On the other hand, they may just have used Comixology as practice and it is a sign of a new hacker rather than the site/service being important.
That was a particularly excellent Handbook entry. I think the trouble with stealing a space shuttle would be storage. You’d have to steal an airport to hide it in, at which point you’re probably about to fall off the difficulty curve of crime.
I’ve probably suggested this before, but a compilation of the handbook segments would be not only great but a handy way to check who you’ve covered in it.
Land of the Lost was a 70sSid and Marty Kroft show where a family ends up in s Savage Land type land in the middle of the Earth with dinosaurs, bad lizardmen and a wookie/ewok kid that helps them.
Didnt Eric Stephenson also slag off superhero comics?
I believe Web Of circa Missing in Action was written by David Michellinie (sp?). The Marc Silvestri credit is correct. However Paul was mistaken in saying that the comic wasn’t bad. It was bad. Early Web Of makes me pine for Howard Mackie comics. Those issues belong alongside the worst of Terry Kavanaugh in the Spidey Hall of Shame.
Maybe they could take inspiration from the Soviets and hide the shuttle in plain sight. I mean, the Russians did turn a Buran orbiter into a theme park attraction. That could probably work in this case too.
I never considered how ingrained HtA is for me until Paul mentioned reading books for preschoolers and I thought, “I would totally read his reviews of those.”
I was amused by at least two uses of wrestling jargon during the pod.
@Mark – what were they? I can’t remember at all…
@Martin – I worked this out recently – you’re looking at about 20 hours of the Handbook over the past five years, which is a terrifying amount of nonsense.
@Cass – As someone who purchased Essential Web of Spider-Man v1 for a train journey, I can only agree.
I think it’s funny Al rattles off like three John Carpenter movies as his favorite Kurt Russell films. They really did team up to do some great movies. Big Trouble was really rooted in pulp and it seems to be making a comeback. Some publisher tried to do a Snake Plisken series and it went like two issues ( was there an issue with Kurt Russel’s likeness or something ) before it went under.
I always though a best of Handbook episode would be great for when you guys took a break but 20 hours now makes me think it would be more work that a podcast.
Instead if releasing a 121 part super cut, just do 1-10, 11-20 etc.
Missing In Action was my own private kingdom, and I’ll defend it with my life, sir!
I love those Marc Silvestri/Kyle Baker stories. Silvestri’s art was a lot less angular and rendered than now – I never read his Image work – but with Baker’s inks on top? *perfetto* Really strong articulation of the more growny-uppy (maybe even Yuppie) Peter Parker they were pushing for back then.
Speaking of, Joy Mercado was in one of the in-hindsight-and-also-at-the-time dodgiest issues of Spidey ever, where he fights real-life terrorists, and Joy Mercado tries to teach the world the history of *certain tumultuous British Isles political conflicts* in one page. And now she’s in Moon Knight! *sarcastic thumbs-up*
http://www.spiderfan.org/characters/mercado_joy.html
That DC Thomson does so little with their intellectual properties is by turns baffling and beautiful in its restraint. They’ve just launched a Diary of a Wimpy Kid rip-off called, unsurprisingly, Hanif Kureshi’s Polio. I mean, The Diary of Dennis the Menace. There SHOULD be a Bananaman movie. There SHOULD be a Bash Street Kids movie. In Poundland. Because it came out fifteen years ago. But Minnie The Minx? Hello! Oor Wullie? Paw Broon turns up at the end giving it “We’d like tae talk to you aboot the Michty Avengers.” Dennis The Menace!!!
I mean, there’s a great chance that it would be honking dogtods. Richard Curtis script, Kieth Lemonn cameo, the Vindaloo video made modern movie. So easy to make, so easy to marmalise. But man. Man!
Yeah, I’m not touching Moon Knight.
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Oh, PS: Sleestak was the screenname of a comics blogger/comments threader in the early post-milennium, too. Sure I use to see him around NeilAlieN, Postmodernbarney, etc..
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Transformers UK did indeed get me into comics as a kid, but it was another licensing deal of the time that got me into Marvel generally – Secret Wars. So for me, hearing that somebody thinks licensed properties don’t bring people to comics is almost incomprehensible. Maybe the problem is that comicbook companies aren’t trying to do this more nowadays ( with current properties) that’s the problem.
Or maybe it’s needless repetition.
A few minor comments:
Five years ago, the DnA run of Guardians of the Galaxy was in full swing, and Rocket Raccoon was quickly becoming a fan-favorite. So a series might not have been out of the question. (In fact, there was a Rocket & Groot mini, I think.)
You forgot to mention Warren Ellis’ run on Secret Avengers, which I thought was great. It had Moon Knight in it, actually, plus some phenomenal art.
Acker and Blacker wrote the recent Thunderbolts Annual, which I was pleasantly surprised by. This bodes well for their run. (I suppose Soule finally found his upper limit of books.)
Come to think of it, I have to agree with Dave; my entry into comics were via two Archie licensed properties, their version of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, and Sonic the Hedgehog, still running twenty years later.
(Incidentally, if you want to read about a ridiculously convoluted comic book legal rights case that doesn’t get the same buzz as the high profile ones, this is a weirdly hypnotic read: http://theamazingsallyhogan.tumblr.com/post/68112487973/sonic-the-hedgehog-ken-penders-bioware-electronic)
I think a key difference now, though, is that the common licenses aren’t directed at kids any more, and that typical licenses aren’t similar enough to regularly published comics to warrant the crossover (although that holds more for Marvel and DC than for Image). Marvel’s Castle and Dark Tower stuff is certainly not aimed at kids, and those who are fans of those properties aren’t going to find a lot at Marvel similar to them to get into. In comparison, it’s not that far of a leap for a kid to go from Transformers or TNMT and get into superhero comics. Again, Image complicates that picture; if you like the Walking Dead, then we certainly have enough zombie comics to keep you for a long, long time.
I’m kind of surprised, too, that this version of Thunderbolts is sticking around long enough for a third writing crew to take over. As long as Daniel Way is kept away from it, though, there’s hope.
Oh, PS: Sleestak was the screenname of a comics blogger/comments threader in the early post-milennium, too. Sure I use to see him around NeilAlieN, Postmodernbarney, etc..
We really do need a new term to replace “LOCer” or “letterhack.”
Re: Ellis… It’s good that he finally reigned in some of his trademarks. I really wish certain other writers would realize this about their own writing and dial it back a little.
@Clay – the Rocket/Groot stories were backups in the Annihilators minis. Even at the time, GotG was a solid lower-midcard Marvel book; I’m not sure they would have swung for a Rocket book. Even now, before the movie comes out and its reception can be judged, I’m kind of surprised they’re doing one.
We reviewed the Acker/Blacker Deadpool annual a few months back; it wasn’t bad, though it had a weird interpretation of Madcap. I’m a TAH fan though, so hopefully they’ll hit their stride on TBolts.
DNA did some really solid work on the cosmic Marvel universe. That makes their decision to put Bendis on the GoTG book strange because, if there is anything Bendis is known for, it’s ignoring what went before. Pair that with Loeb on Nova and you have to wonder if they understand what they’re doing.
Is Quesada’s ban on cigarettes still in force? That might explain the lack of them in MOON KNIGHT. 🙂
If you guys are starting to forget whether you covered certain characters on the show, it might be time to make a list. A Official Handbook of the Official Handbook of the Official Handbook of the Marvel Universe, if you will.
@Al – “angle” and “gimmick”
I’d love to see a Big Trouble / Buckaroo Banzai cross-over, since they were both written by the same person (earl mac rauch) if i remember right.
Bendis’s GOTG is horrid. It’s beyond horrid. It’s horridly pointless. Nothing happens that matters.
Is Charles Soule evidence that Wolverine being in all those different titles isn’t so far fetched after all?
Anyway, here is my current theory of the popularity of comics: Forget sophistication and drama, forget relevance and social commentary. Make ’em trashy. I’m reading the Fantastic Four Masterworks. The art is surprisingly good, if simplistic, but the writing is not what we’d think of as good. But nevertheless, it is good. A lot of it is just sketches in the air. Thing is suicidal and pathologically violent, but there’s no study of this, there’s no exploration of what it means to have your identity obscured by a rocky carapace. There’s a word balloon hinting that way, then some punching. And despite the lack of detail, and despite the 50-odd years between then and now, I still get hooked on the ridiculous stories, and genuinely get involved. My imagination fills in the blanks. That’s where comics excel. That’s why people like Rob Liefeld get popular, and people love a Jim Lee page where there’s sixteen people in the same pose. Because all you really need is a whole lot of flash and just enough substance, to feed your own mind. But most comics today get the equation backwards. They put in more and more substance and just enough flash, if any. Flash is a bit childish you know.
So merchandising is the opposite of bad for the industry. Shitty comics, as long as they’re the right kind of shitty, are the opposite of bad for the industry. People love trash.
Which isn’t to say there’s no room for literature or high art in comics. There absolutely is, and I would hate to see it go. But that’s not going to hook a lot of new readers. It’s something you need to be climatised to. Let’s have a bit of everything, and stop cringing at the silly stuff.
I’m now imagining that Aguirre-Sacasa was promoted to Chief Creative Officer for his initiative in smuggling the word “zombie” into the cut-up room.
I think I acquired a vague idea about Archie comics from having to look up why the post-Zero Hour LoSH was called “the Archie Legion”. I remember being surprised to learn that Clarissa Explains It All With Magic was based on a comic.
Shortpacked!‘s take on Eric Stephenson, if anyone hasn’t seen it:
http://www.shortpacked.com/index.php?id=2026
I got into comics largely through The Real Ghostbusters and Doctor Who Magazine, incidentally. (Unless you count The Beano.)
More to the point, I got into “real” comics because I recognised the characters from films and TV. (The X-Men! I know who they are! Iceman and Firestar were members before they became Spider-Man’s Amazing Friends!) As far as I as a comics newbie was concerned, there wasn’t really any difference.
Like at least one commenter above (havent read them all yet), I got into comics in the late 1980’s through Archie Comics’s Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Adventures series.
I think licensed characters don’t really have the.same effect now as they did in the 80s and 90s for a few reasons. For one thing, they are too damn expensive now. I could justify to my mom spending $0.75 to $1.25, but current price points discourage on-the-whim purchases. (and theres less story per issue to boot).
I think the fact that comics arent universally sold at most drugstores and retail.stores has also hurt. I used to buy my comics at K&B/Rite Aid, Eckerd’s/CVS, and Wal-Mart. I dont think ive seen comics theres since I bought the Uncannt issues of “The Shattering” back in 1999 (good story, btw)
Further, most flagship comics are no linger marketed to kids. Sure, some are, but too many of the books that “matter” are lazily gratuitous in their sex/violence/language content for mothers to buy their 9 year olds.
Something I always think that goes along with Si’s point – narration boxes are boring, and thought bubbles were better. In old comics you literally knew what the characters were thinking (as you do in novels), but in modern comics the boxes that replaced thought bubbles are very often making some metaphorical point rather than showing the main characters’ state of mind, or having any real relevance to the plot. All because thought bubbles aren’t as sophisticated.
With all the new changes at Archie, do we know whether we’ll ever finally get to see TMNT “Forever War”? I cant believe its been nearly 20 yrs since that got axed.
I learned aboyt Archie from Chasing Amy, which coincided with my starting to buy Previews every month, which came shortly before Archie Meets The Punisher. Still yet to read any, but that’s okay: if you read the Simpsons comic long enough, you’ll get a pastiche issue. Oh, although, I did see a bit of Return To Riverdale as a kid, I think.
I started off with the American Marvels and UK weekly reprints simultaneously, thanks to a very generous grandmother. This predated the rise of the licensed toy comic at Marvel UK, but we also had mags like Look-In, Planet of the Apes, and even things like annuals based on the TV version of the Hulk.
The Transys comics were an important part of *both* hobbies (“Comics” and “Transformers”) in a way that the Zoids things weren’t. I also had the watch, the audio tapes, etc.. I guess nowadays the yout’ have apps and skateboards and sippy cups and “so matrix; very Nebulan” memes to scratch whatever additional urges they might have towards wasting their disposable income.
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If Slide were to be repositioned as a guy who commits frying pan-themed crimes, it seems to me that his most obvious role would be as a Forbush Man villain.
Al> @Clay – the Rocket/Groot stories were backups in the Annihilators minis. Even at the time, GotG was a solid lower-midcard Marvel book; I’m not sure they would have swung for a Rocket book. Even now, before the movie comes out and its reception can be judged, I’m kind of surprised they’re doing one.
The Rocket/Groot story from Annihilators was originally announced as a mini by itself – that’s why it had full-length stories rather than backup-length ones, like the backup from the later Annihilators: Earthfall mini.
Archie did well in Scandinavia in the eighties, but then again any comic could succeed in Scandinavia in the eighties. Even the Care Bears comic book got three years.
Slide should team up with Paste Pot Pete.
@Si – I actually had the same thought. Considering that pretty much every Paste Pot Pete/Trapster appearance that I can recall ends up with him or at least one of his allies stuck in his own glue after his gun explodes or he shoots too indiscriminately, having a partner that he can’t accidentally screw over would be a huge boon to his career. Or at the very least he should look into copying the guys tech – there’s really no excuse for Paste Pot Pete not having a paste-proof poncho.
I was interested to hear that Archie wasn’t well known in the UK. Here in New Zealand it would be the one comic that most people have read at one time or another, followed by Asterix and Tintin.
I still hold up Cap 108 asan example of Pete written competently and he only was defeated by Cap thanks to outside interference by Agent 13.
The Trapster has had a super-solvent since at least Avengers #6, where he trades it to the Avengers for parole to help them defeat Baron Zemo’s…er…Adhesive X. He’s had super-lubricants — and yes, we all know what that sounds like — since at least Captain America v.1 #324, a Mark Gruenwald issue that also has Whirlwind add blades to his costume.