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 Saturday, August 11, 2007
Wizard World Chicago Seems to Be Morphing
Posted by maggie
If San Diego seems to be filled with media fans looking for freebies from movies and tv, Chicago's exhibit floor seems to be packed with comics collectors (yes, and toy collectors) looking to fill collection holes and booths featuring big discounts on boxes and boces of comics. Point is: What used to have a Big Exhibit tone is developing into a great comics-collecting venue. Me? I found a Better Little Book for Harlan Ellison, some military magazines for my son-in-law, and a battered collection of Foxy Grandpa for me. Back to the fray; it's hard getting through thr aisles, though they're wide.
8/11/2007 4:36:29 PM (Central Daylight Time, UTC-05:00) 
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Comics, Comics, Comics in Chicago
Posted by maggie
Wrestling with my phone (which has traumas on the exhibit floor) causes a delay in posting. Sorry! In any case, a fascinating series of discussions with long-time collector Jack Mallette, who pulled out Comic Book Magazine from 1941: a weekkly newspaper supplement from The Chicago Tribune. (When did it begin? How long did it last? We want to know. My bet is that World War II paper shortages brought it to an end.) Also, Fast Willie #6. (How's that for a title? Fitzgerald Periodicals 1977.) Anyway, the dealer floor seems packed with bargains, with many (most?) trade paperbacks at 50% off.
8/11/2007 4:28:08 PM (Central Daylight Time, UTC-05:00)
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Back to the Show
Posted by maggie
In the quick gallop around the floor last night, I found many exhibitors expressing fatigue regarding this year's short time between the San Diego and Chicago shows. "Too close, too close!" said one.
8/11/2007 10:11:28 AM (Central Daylight Time, UTC-05:00)
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Uh Oh, No Cameras! Now What?
Posted by maggie
As I was still getting breakfast, the intrepid Ray called to say he was 600th in line for the Dark Knight panel and had just been told he wasn't allowed to bring his camera in. Could I come get his camera? Well, no. What would help would be Press Sign-In information including such restrictions for any venues in which they'll be in force. My suggestion: Tell the folks in line that you'll be back, go to the Press Sign-In Booth, ask them to take care of the camera, and get back in line. I'll keep you posted. Geez.
8/11/2007 10:00:51 AM (Central Daylight Time, UTC-05:00)
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Friday, August 10, 2007
End of Day Friday at Wizard World Chicago
Posted by maggie
Most of the day was spent in the drive from Iola, as Dark Horse Star Wars writer John Jackson Miller and I talked about countless topics, comics-related and otherwise. Once at the show, I rushed to catch Mr. Silver Age's quiz panel, coming in halfway through but enjoying (and videotaping) what I saw. (I also took photos of the panel, which pitted a fan team against -- another fan team.) Major topic of discussion was next year's show dates: in June! Friday-evening tradition continued, with Mark and Stephanie Heike (Stephanie appears below with her 21st Centurions comic book), Andrew Pepoy, and me going out to dinner followed by a silent movie. This year was the best yet: Harold Lloyd in Welcome Danger.
8/10/2007 11:33:23 PM (Central Daylight Time, UTC-05:00)
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Thursday, August 09, 2007
Will I See You in Chicago?
Posted by maggie
As schedules turned out, I won't be heading for Wizard World Chicago until tomorrow morning -- and it'll take about five hours or more to drive there. So at the moment, it's back to packing and trying to remember what to take along. As was the case last year, Comics Buyer's Guide will be (as we say) walking the floor, rather than staking out a booth -- so I can't guarantee where I'll be when (though I'm hoping to contribute somehow to Mr. Silver Age's Friday panel at 3:30 p.m. in the Marshall Rogers Room). And Friday night I'm heading to a silent movie (thanks to the ongoing enthusiasms of Andrew Pepoy, who makes the arrangements in advance). And and and. You can see what I look like, if you check this blog's header, above. Say hi! You'll also spot me from the cameras I'll be toting. I don't know whether I'll ever be able to post it, but I've got video from the February Javits Center show and the San Diego show. Let's see what I can get in Chicago!
8/9/2007 2:44:21 PM (Central Daylight Time, UTC-05:00)
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Wednesday, August 08, 2007
And Who WAS That Masked Man?
Posted by maggie
No, not The Lone Ranger. The other masked man. Photo taken Sunday at Comic-Con International: San Diego. The gear is authentic. So who is it? 
8/8/2007 4:15:00 PM (Central Daylight Time, UTC-05:00)
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Other Eisner Awards Photos
Posted by maggie
I'm sure you've already seen lots of photos of Jonathan Ross kissing Neil Gaiman at the July 27, 2007, Eisner Awards. Heck, we posted some of my shots of The Snog at CBGXtra.com. But I thought you might enjoy a couple of other photos. Top one is Neil taken aback to be receiving the Bob Clampett Humanitarian Award for the Many, Many Good Things He Does. (His comment on his website: "I said that the world of comics was a family, and you look after your family.") Second photo is of The Dynamic Duo of the Evening: Award Wrangler Jane Wiedlin (of The Go-Go's) and Master of Ceremonies Bill Morrison (of Bongo). One Eisner Award winner had been presented with a sort of World Wrestlers Belt and had left it onstage, which was just as well, because it looked great on her, don't you think?  
8/8/2007 4:11:08 PM (Central Daylight Time, UTC-05:00)
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I Have the Key to the Marvel Vault!
Posted by maggie
Wow! Running Press has just sent me a copy of The Marvel Vault by Roy Thomas and Peter Sanderson, a so-called "A Museum-in-a-Book" that looks to be a gem of considerable luster. The promotional material said it's scheduled for release in October, but Rory Root had copies at his Comic Relief booth at Comic-Con International: San Diego. (The only reasons I didn't buy a copy there were the combination of its being heavy and my concern that it'd get damaged in shipping. The copy I just received here, by the way, came through fine.) I'd drooled over it at the show, after a fast glance through its pages -- and I still haven't had the chance to do much more than gloat over it in the presence of other CBG staffers: "Nyah, nyah! I got a copy of this incredible volume! Weep with jealousy!" It's a spiral-bound volume, full-color, its 192 heavy pages packed with information. But wait! There's more! It's the sort of thing we always dreamed of: not only a history of Marvel from 1932 (with a photo of Publisher Martin Goodman) to 2007 (complete with promotional images from 2007) and beautiful reproductions of lots and lots and lots of art, but also ... Also plastic pockets containing stunning goodies in carefully designed formats. "Sketches" from 1941 and 1942, reproduced to look as if they were, indeed, pencilled on aged drawing paper that had been stored away ever since. Faithful (albeit reduced) reproductions of postcards Bill Everett sent to his daughter in 1956. A repro of Stan Lee's original synopsis for Fantastic Four #1. And more, more, more. And that's just from an initial glance through the first 70 pages. This is a must-buy for any Marvel fan. ISBN 0-7624-2844-9. $49.95. Wow.
8/8/2007 2:52:00 PM (Central Daylight Time, UTC-05:00)
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If You're Trying to Reach NYC People Today ...
Posted by maggie
... you may not be able to, because that area is suffering from nasty weather on 8/8. Daughter Valerie just called to say she was fine, though it took her three and a half extra hours to get to work at E. 57th and Second. A tree hit her train, etc., etc. Many offices, stores, and the like will either be short-staffed or unable to open. So, if you were planning that chatty conversation with someone at Marvel or DC, you might want to wait till tomorrow.
8/8/2007 10:54:35 AM (Central Daylight Time, UTC-05:00)
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A Picture Is Worth ...
Posted by maggie
... well, whatever. The point is that I've finally had a chance to save some of my con photos to disc and have gone back to embellish some earlier postings. (And discovered that I told the same anecdote twice. Sigh. The learning curve is loooooong.) So, even if you've been devotedly reading this blog right along, you might want to zip back through the archives to see what may have been illuminated since last you visited.
8/8/2007 8:21:04 AM (Central Daylight Time, UTC-05:00)
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Media Views of History
Posted by maggie
We have a movie-watching group at the office. A number of staffers in different Krause Publications departments meet for lunch once a month with a goal of discussing a film (picked the month before from one member's list of three). This month's pick was Ivanhoe, starring Robert Taylor. I watched the DVD last night, and it brought to mind my favorite reference book regarding this sort of film: The Hollywood History of the World (1988, New York: Beech Tree Books) by George MacDonald Fraser (author of the Flashman series), who gets past the criticisms of this era of such films (too clean-looking, for example) to look at the accuracies of historical movies. Though he does have such remarks as:
To some extent, Hollywood has had to create the Middle Ages in its own image, and has not been helped by the fact that men in armour are difficult to take seriously. They not only look clumsy and overdressed, clanking about and inviting ribaldries about spanners and tin-openers, they seldom sound right either. This is largely the fault of Sir Walter Scott, who imposed his own style of 'Look-for-the-knight-of-the-Fetterlock-fair-Rebecca' dialogue on the Age of Chivalry, setting a pattern which survived well into talking pictures; in the 1950s they were still 'prithee-my-liege'-ing away because it was the traditional thing to do, and audiences were supposed to expect it.
(I note that the Ivanhoe screenwriter didn't do that. Good for him!)
Fraser comments on his suspicion that, "however faithful the research, costumes, weaponry, and the like, no representation of medieval combat can give us a wholly accurate impression of what it was really like ... I would still like to see two modern armies clad in plate and mail, the cavalry cap-a-pie on shire horses, and equipped with the best our museums could provide, and let them get on with it. I have a notion that within fifteen minutes they would all be prostrate, yet this, presumably, did not happen at Crecy or Bannockburn or Agincourt. We know that only a small proportion of medieval fighters wore full armour, but they are the ones I am concerned with, and I must suppose either that combat took place in slow motion or, more probably, that there was a technique to wearing and moving in armour that has been lost. I also suspect, in the face of scholarly opinion, that our ancestors, whatever their stature, were stronger than we are, and anyone who doubts this will oblige me by going to Glasgow's Kelvingrove Museum and lifting, let alone wielding, one of the two-handed claymores on display there."
Discussing Knights of the Round Table:
This, and other armoured epics, owed much to Robert Taylor, who was not an obvious costume player. As a clean-cut heart-throb of the late thirties he seemed to belong in slacks and sports jacket, but while he was no Flynn or Power or Fairbanks when it came to swashbuckling, he had something they lacked, an air of stern but good-natured gentlemanliness. It seemed to fit him exactly for the tales of Walter Scott, and it is pleasant to think that he brought something of the great enchanter's work to millions who would never have ploughed through the originals.
Going on to Ivanhoe in particular, he comments that the film holds to the Scott novel, "more or less."
... besides sundry jousts there is a most realistic duel between Ivanhoe and Bois-Gilbert ... Anyone interested in the technique of the medieval weapon known as the flail (a spiked ball and chain on a short handle) will find this scene illuminating.
Yes, ouch.
In any case, it's interesting that -- despite comics' focus on action adventure -- comic-book stories involving that era have always been minimal. My guess is that, not only is there a hesitation about doing historical adventures because of the problems of accurate portrayal of an era, simply drawing the doggoned armor (not to mention the horses) is too tricky for many artists of today.
Even more of a tip of the hat, then, to Eric Shanower for his Age of Bronze series, in which he not only tells the story of an even earlier era well but gets correct the scholarship of his images.
8/8/2007 6:51:13 AM (Central Daylight Time, UTC-05:00)
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