Rough and ready

Intruder is 14 (now 15 + cover) pages of fun between me and Scott LeMien. It pleases me and that’s all it’s for. Rest assured, the horror and blasphemy to follow in the next paragraphs shall not singe a hair upon the wisdom of comics creation that everyone knows. (As for the many how-to’s and about-comics accounts that do correspond to what I’m saying, shhhh!)

Living comics

I’ve been thinking about when and how superheroes are “alive” in the culture. Swing a stick right now, and you’ll hit someone telling you that all is roses. Superheroes are in! They are arrived! They are (gasp) cool at last! … whereas all my little eye sees is that they are in the cage. They have “arrived” in the sense of at rest. They are tamed at last.

Dark Matter: inspiration and fun

More comics, creativity, and role-playing intersection – it’s a fine day. This is about Abby Baldwin’s own graphic novel Dark Matter, serving as the conceptual jumping-off point for role-playing my alpha version of Champions Now with her dad Robert. Here’s my conversation with Robert about all sorts of concepts and angles on it.

For quick reference on the project, I’ve done my own playtesting with the alpha version, as shown in my videos about the Defiants, and several other groups are giving my feedback (e.g. this post) about doing that too. I’m now moving into Beta testing with several groups at once, and receiving feedback from others too.

So not making friends here

Because in the course of dissecting an autobiographical point, I’m forced to say things you don’t wanna hear about the Wild Cards series.

The change of illusion

Six li’l issues of The Avengers. Do they really bear the whole weight of the history of Marvel Comics, and perhaps even of fan culture’s creative intestinal torsion? It can’t be that simple, but even at age thirteen-fourteen, I knew something was happening.

One twist of the wrist

Up in the sky! It’s an homage! So, is that a copy? A rip-off? Or is it a good thing? Is it cool? (tail-chasing ensues)

Spider-Schlep

In one of the letter columns in the late-80s Question, Denny O’Neil refers to Peter Parker as a schlep, and always having been one. That’s Yiddish, and a little confusing because that precise word is a verb meaning to lug something inconvenient, but here, and as I’ve often heard or used it, it’s short for schlepper, meaning an inept, stupid person.

I just want to talk to him

Today’s about two comics published simultaneously in the mid-late 1990s, both of which I bought start to finish and for which I own the full runs. Each concerns going to find God and have a little talk. With a bullet.

God, an aardvark, and the man in between

This is the final page of issue 98. The text at the bottom indicates the title of the following issue – it reads, “Next: More theology”

Speak not the name! Wait for it … Dave Sim. OooOOoohh!

Everyday religion

First things first: never mind “belief.” I’m talking about upbringing, expectations, habits, and unconsidered identity, and about the real-world, utterly political history of institutions and communities.

Read your Bible

If anyone had suggested in 1968 that Bob Crumb should be drawing the Bible, they’d have been laughed outta the joint.

Sense, coincidence, nonsense, and consequence

We’re all grown-ups here, right? Not gonna freak out when I say, all plot is contrivance.