Friday, July 20, 2012

Comic-Con 2012 - Creator Spotlight - Triumph by Greg Broadmore


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Triumph: Unnecessarily Violent Tales of Science Adventure for the Simple and Unfortunate 
by Greg Broadmore

Triumph, as I shall call it, is the third steampunk book by Weta designer Greg Broadmore. This book contains two comic book stories with 6 pages of adverts for rayguns and rockets in between. The book is a lavish production with huge 8.5 by 12 inch pages of thick paper (nearly cardstock) wrapped in hardcovers. Broadmore's style is bright and bold, with plenty of jokes, one-liners and irony in the dialog.

The stories feature the pompous British adventurer, Lord Cockswain, sporter of bushy muttonchop sideburns, wearer of jhodpers, and lacking both tact and patience with his trigger-finger. Much of the humor and charm of Cockswain is the utter lack of consequences for his often horrific actions as hinted at in the subtitle of the book.

The lavish production values push up the price of the book, but it also pushes it into being an art piece. The stories follow the pompous Lord Cockswain as he rockets from place to place spreading British rule and punishing the local inhabitants with the fallout of his aforementioned trigger finger.

In the first story, "Into the Lair of the Space Wankers," Cockswain finds himself marooned on the planet that makes the solar system's most popular fizzy drink and inadvertently uncovers the secrets of Kuiper Kola. And then causes mass havoc.

The second story follows a psychiatrist following Cockswain on a hunting trip where the shrink is trying to get the adventurer to open up about his emotions. It doesn't end well for said psychiatrist, I must say.

The book does end well for the readers, however. It is a joy to behold and there is much fun in rooting out new humorous touches and background gags with each rereading. And there are Moon Maidens, fake movie one-sheets, beer ads, and did I mention Moon Maidens?

It also doesn't hurt that Broadmore is a terrific chap that patiently sketched and autographed each book for the eager fans.

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Sunday, July 15, 2012

Comic-Con 2012 - Creator Spotlight - The North End of the World

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Today is the first in a series where I look at individual creators that I met at the 2012 San Diego Comic-Con. Today I'll be discussing Shadow Catcher Entertainment's graphic novel called, The North End of the World. I will say right now this one took me by surprise and I loved it.

I chatted with Emalee Pearson in their booth and learned that they were making a thick hardcover graphic novel about early American documentary photographer and filmmaker, Edward Curtis. In the early 1900's Curtis had a 20 volume series containing 1500 photographs of Native Americans. In 1923 he set off into the wilds of the Northwest to create the film, The Cannibal at the North End of the World. 

The journey to make that film as well as discover the nature of man and his own soul is the story of this epic single volume oversize hardcover graphic novel. I received a short preview version and I must say it was quite compelling. I am very interested in reading the full volume. The art by Christopher Shy is striking and difficult to describe (Bill Sienkiewicz-ish?) so I will show some images that have been posted online. The book is written by Dave Hunsaker and his beautiful words are laid into the art without adding panels or word bubbles. It is hard to describe, but it works (I put some examples from one of the artist's other books called "Soul Stealer"). The graphic design lets the words live over the art with out disrupting it and is easy to follow. Not an easy task, and beautifully done. It is effortless to follow the flow.

This is a book I plan on getting when it comes out later this year.


A Double Page Spread
Pages from "Soul Stealer":



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Saturday, July 14, 2012

Comic-Con Sat

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Saturday was a busy one... and my last day at the Con

Here's some pix...

Uchronic Tales at the Con!

To the Aether and Beyond!


Many Fett


















                
MiB Father                                                                                                     Tardis Son

The Mummy from the upcoming animated movie Hotel Transylvania



Gentle Giant had the Slave Leia action again


Wookie

Great makeup on this Red Skull
Doctor Who
The battle of the year - Vader vs Chaplin


I guess Vader won, but he's running away from this Predator

Red Sonja

Captain Jack just escaped the head-hunters and ran into the convention center!


Batsquad


These are army men sized zombies. I hope they come by the bag!



My Little Pony World


50 years of James Bond on film


Privateer Press showed a bunch of stuff...

Level 7 (escape) is a new semi coop boardgame

Heap is a Scrappers War Machine board game


Warmachine






The prop store has an unbelievable selection of authentic movie props. None of the coolest stuff was for sale.


Alien space suit worn by John Hurt




Ray Harryhausen Ymir

Judge Dredd


Ghostbusters!

Conan Sword Prop

Blade Runner original story board

insert slate from Empire Strikes Back

Deathstar mini piece Star Wars

Batman Returns

Tron Helmet


Star Wars Cantina Band

robot arm from Silent Running - a favorite movie of mine...

Lionsgate was showing off their 2 big properties - Hunger Games and Expendables 2.



Wonder Woman

Sony showed off Resident Evil: Retribution, Looper, Total Recall, Elysium, After Earth and Robocop.


Looper guns




Looper hoverbike

Total Recall car


Elysium attack ship


Total Recall car interior

After Earth costume


Some joker trying to get through the Elysium Border Checkpoint


Warner Bros had some little movie called The Hobbit - It was very crowded.




Kevin Bacon!

Alien Action Figures





Original Pulp Art



Steam Crow has great posters and cards and such. I bought a 2nd beer glass. Super cool folks.

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles



There was a massive He Man Masters of the universe display with He-Man and Skelator








Human

Matching Action figure (on right)


She Ra

This is the stuff I loved as a kid. I had the Space Station, Fire Bolt Space Cannon, the crawler and Major Matt Mason and a bunch of the guys. I loved seeing this display at the Mattel booth. It brought back a lot of good memories.







Yep. Death is a toy. Vertigo Death.


Watchmen - Doctor Manhattan

Rorschach

Mattel had a bunch of these exclusives on display.


Paul and Lauren Martinez are great folks who publish Paul's book The Adventures of the 19XX, a pulpy comic that takes place in the 1930's. Great fun. They sell t-shirts and messenger bags featuring Zeppelins and biplanes and other pulpy goodness. You can find them here.

I am the Tick!

Because we all need Klingon Monopoly...

Greg Bear was signing Halo posters and Go Inexplicables!

Harry - they had Annoying Orange

I had never heard of this 2005 Charles Band movie starring Gary Busey... Gingerbread Man

Mike Mignola chats up the fans


Magic The Gathering had their own cafe / store
And that wraps my pictures of the Con. I had a great time and talked to a lot of very cool folks. I'll write up some stories tomorrow.


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