From: esti@quads.uchicago.edu (Paul A. Estin)
Subject: WELCOME TO REC.ARTS.COMICS (parts 0-2 of 5)
Summary:  monthly information post
Reply-To: esti@midway.uchicago.edu
Organization: University of Michigan Psychology Department, C&P
Date: Sun, 5 Apr 1992 16:30:25 GMT

WELCOME TO REC.ARTS.COMICS (parts 0-2 of 5)
written by lots of different people
edited by Paul A. Estin

[last update: 04/05/92]

0.	Introduction

	This is a newsgroup devoted to the discussion of comic books,
comic strips, graphic novels, and sequential art.  Feel free to ask
questions or post articles on any of those topics.  Enjoy!

	This article, posted monthly, is provided to help out new
readers of r.a.c.  It contains five parts:

1. glossary of some common terms
	[ADDITION]
2. answers to frequently-asked questions
	[CHANGES and ADDITIONS]
3. guidelines for posting articles
4. e-mail/ftp addresses to ask for various types of comics-related files
	[CHANGES]
5. e-mail addresses of comics-related mailing lists.

	For more general information about Usenet, please examine the
newsgroups news.announce.newusers and news.newusers.questions; there
is lots of useful information in them.  Feel free to e-mail me if you
have any suggestions as to what should be included in this "Welcome to
Rec.arts.comics" post.


1.	The USENET/ Rec.arts.comics lingo glossary:

bandwidth = analogous to a radio bandwidth (frequency), referring to
	the resources needed to propagate posts.  Usually used in the
	phrase "stop wasting bandwidth", which means simply "don't post
	unnecessarily"
btw = by the way
CBG = Comic Buyers' Guide, a weekly newspaper
Crisis = the Crisis on Infinite Earths (usually).  (See the "Frequently-
	Asked Questions" section below.)
CSN = Comic Shop News, a free weekly hype sheet
dangling plotline = an unresolved plotline or mystery which an author
	has apparently forgotten about, since it hasn't been mentioned
	in a long time.  Sometimes abbreviated "dangler".
flame = an inflammatory, insulting post
flame war = a flame response to a flame responding to a flame...
"the fourth wall" = originally used with reference to stage sets, this
	term refers to the imaginary wall between the characters and
	the audience.  "Breaking the fourth wall" refers to comics
	in which the characters are aware that they exist in a comic
	book, sometimes for the purpose of humor.
furry = anthropomorphic animal
FYI = for your information
IMHO = in my humble (or honest) opinion
IMPO = in my personal (or pompous) opinion
IOW = in other words
ito = in terms of
JLA, JLE, JLI, JLUTB = the popular DC super-hero groups "Justice League
	America", "Justice League Europe", "Justice League International",
	and for those tired of them, the hypothetical "Justice League
	Up-the-Butt"
kill file = a file usable in the "rn" and "nn" news programs that one can
	keep to "filter out" disliked topics, keywords, or posters
LSH = Legion of Super-heroes (a DC comic book)
OHOTMUDE = Official Handbook of the Marvel Universe, Deluxe Edition
patch = (see retcon)
pod person (or just 'pod') = a character who has been taken over by a
	new writer and/or editor and immediately acts very inconsistently with
	previous characterization, with no explanation given for the change.
	The term is from the mid-50s movie Invasion of the Body Snatchers,
	where aliens grew duplicates of people in giant pods. In r.a.c., the
	term is meant to indicate that the character is being so poorly
	handled relative to past characterization that the previous character
	seems to no longer exist and might as well have been replaced between
	issues by a physical duplicate grown in a pod somewhere...though no
	other character seems to notice the change. First use of 'pod' was in
	reference to the changeover after Giffen left the JLI titles
	concerning the characters Fire, Ice, Max, and Oberon.
post-Crisis = events/history/characters in the DC Universe as they existed
	*after* the Crisis on Infinite Earths.  (See the "Frequently-Asked
	Questions" section below.)
pre-Crisis = events/history/characters in the DC Universe as they existed
	*prior* to the Crisis on Infinite Earths.  (See the "Frequently-
	Asked Questions" section below.)
retcon = to retroactively change the continuity of a character or title.
	(This term, a r.a.c favorite, was coined by Damian Cugley).
		Originally, the term "retcon" was used only in cases where the
	interpretation of "facts" from earlier stories is changed, but the
	facts themselves are preserved.  For example, Alan Moore took took the
	character Swamp Thing, previously considered to be a man transformed
	into a plant creature, and with minimal changes to facts presented in
	previous stories, wrote Swamp Thing to be a "plant elemental", one of
	a long line of such beings.  Other standard examples would be Alan
	Moore's Miracleman, and the various retcons of Phoenix/Jean Grey in
	X-Men.
		A "patch" was the term used (taken from programmer's jargon)
	to mean an actual change, rather than merely filling in details.
		These days, however, "retcon" is used increasingly to mean
	changes to history as well as to retroactive continuity.  So, to
	"retcon" is to change history, so that something that had existed in
	the continuity of the fictional universe, not ONLY doesn't exist now,
	but in the fictional history, NEVER HAS existed.  This can be true of
	an event, of a character, or whatever.  For example, if Hawkman
	appears in the Justice League, and then	years later a writer decides
	that "No, Hawkman just came to Earth, he was *never* in the Justice
	League," that's a retcon.
                Retcon is also listed in the New Hacker's Dictionary, with
        credit given to r.a.c.
signal-to-noise ratio = in a newsgroup, the proportion of useful articles
	to useless ones (such as flames).  We like to keep the signal
	relatively high and the noise very low.
SOL = s--t out of luck
spoilers = information about a comic which could spoil the surprise for
	those who haven't read it yet
Squiddy = what some people call the annual r.a.c. Awards. See the next section
        for why this is the case.
TMNT = Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles
wrt = with respect to
WSD = willing suspension of disbelief
:-) = a "smiley", used to indicate humor or sarcasm


2.	Frequently-Asked Questions

* What was the Crisis on Infinite Earths?
	The _Crisis on Infinite Earths_ was a 12-issue series
published by DC in 1985-6.  The "Crisis" effectively revamped the
entire DC Universe by merging several universes (containing the
various DC characters) into a single universe (whose history is still
somewhat unclear in parts).  The Crisis was used as an opportunity to
change DC history retroactively (see "retcon" in the list of
definitions), including the remaking of several popular (and some
not-so-popular) DC characters.  Thus people refer to the "post-Crisis"
Superman, Wonder Woman, etc., as distinct from the "pre-Crisis"
versions who existed on "Earth 1" or "Earth 2".
	The confusion *really* begins because the revamping and
"retconning" didn't all take place in the Crisis limited series
itself, nor in the comics immediately after then.  If DC had simply
started all their series over from scratch, that might have kept
things pretty straightforward.  Instead, they declared the Pre-Crisis
history to be implicitly intact, until and unless they could
explicitly create the new, post-Crisis versions of characters and
histories.
	Thus, new changes are still being made in titles today, more
than half a decade later.  So, for example, the "old" Hawkman appeared
in the "new" Justice League.  But then Timothy Truman began writing
_Hawkworld_, which retconned Hawkman's character; among other changes,
Hawkman "now" arrived on Earth much later.  *So*, the Hawkman who
appeared in the new Justice League comic (call him the Silver Age
Hawkman, or the pre-Crisis Hawkman) "now" (in real world time) "no
longer exists, and never has" (within current DC continuity).
	Confused yet?  Suffice it to say, the way DC handled the
Crisis and its aftermath confuses *lots* of readers and provides a
perennial topic of discussion on r.a.c.

* Where can I find "Man of Steel, Women of Kleenex"?
	In the late 1960s, Larry Niven wrote a hysterically funny
essay in which he speculated, tongue in cheek, about possible problems
that Superman (pre-Crisis version, of course) would have in attempting
to reproduce.  The essay appears in Niven's collections _All the
Myriad Ways_ and _N-Space_, and in the recent anthology _Alien Sex_.

* How do you spell/pronounce the last name of artist Bill Sienkiewicz?
	It's spelled as above, and pronounced "sin-KEV-itch".

* Wasn't there a Marvel mutant who was gay?
	Most likely you're thinking of the character Northstar
(Jean-Paul Beaubier) from _Alpha Flight_.  When John Byrne was writing
the series (issues #1-26), he made the point that Jean-Paul was gay,
using innuendo-- mostly tiny hints that are very obvious if you're
looking for them.  Here are the main references, paraphrased from
memory.
	In issues #7-8, Northstar and Aurora are visiting an old
friend of his, Raymonde Belmonde, in Montreal. Meeting him, Aurora
says, "Jean-Paul has told me all about you." She then goes off to
change clothes (having just switched personalities). As she comes
back, Belmonde is saying, "So you didn't tell her *all* about me -- I
thought that would have been odd."  After Belmonde has been killed by
the villain, a narration box describes the relationship between him
and Northstar: "Much more than a friend, he taught Jean-Paul Beaubier
not to fear his mutant power -- or any other thing." And at the end,
when Aurora blows up at him, she says "YOU, of all people -- *dare* to
judge *my* love life?"
	Finally, in #11's back-up story giving the origin of Northstar,
James Hudson comments that after Northstar's powers emerged he had 
everything -- fame, money, women; he notes that Northstar didn't seem
to be too interested in the women, and puts it down to the athlete's 
obsession with success at competition.
	The hints were subtle enough that you might not get the idea
independently. But if you read the stories with the possibility in mind,
it was quite clear. (Aurora's outburst particularly makes full sense
only if you realize that Northstar is gay and she knows it. Otherwise
why would *his* judging her be worse than anyone else?)
	There were other tiny hints as well-- nothing that really made
sense unless you knew what to look for.  And then, later in the
series, there were strong hints that Jean-Paul had contracted AIDS.
	Oh, eventually the Editor-in-Chief of Marvel, Jim Shooter
(some debate on this-- it may have been Tom Defalco), declaring "There
are no homosexuals in the Marvel Universe," decided to "fix things."
By that time, Bill Mantlo was writing Alpha Flight, and he retconned
both Northstar and Aurora into being half-human and half-elf (thus
their pointed ears), and decided that Northstar's sickness was due to
being outside of the realm of faerie.  Ecch.
	[RD Francis <francis@cis.ohio-state.edu> notes:
Actually, it should be noted that nothing in the faerie storyline
indicated that Jean-Paul was *not* gay, just that he didn't
necessarily have AIDS.  Also, Mantlo should be given *some* credit.
He dropped several "hints" as well, including an exchange between
Jean-Paul and Jeanne-Marie when they thought Walter was dead, and
another comment when he came back as a women.  J-M saw J-P crying, and
realized that J-P also loved Walter (#28).  And J-P told "Wanda" that
he liked "her" much better as a man (#40-something, 45 or 46 I
believe).  Mantlo's scripting ability being what it is, his "hints"
were pretty damned ham-handed.]
	The "faerie" change was later de-retconned, though I am
unfamiliar with the details.  In any case, much later, in issue #106,
Northstar held a press conference is which he came out of the closet.
(He does *not* have AIDS.)  He was convinced to publically acknowledge
tion his gayness after (1) rescuing and adopting a baby girl with
AIDS, who dies despite a "media circus" of support and (2) getting
into a fight with a WW II-era Canadian superhero "Major Mapleleaf",
who was angry because while the baby girl was perceived as an
innocent, sympathetic victim, the AIDS-related death of his own son
was ignored because of the son's sexual orientation.
	A Marvel editor explained that (paraphrasing), "Many of our
readers suspected the truth all along, but now we decided to make the
issue clear."  Yeah.  Right.
			-Thanks on this one to, among others,
			David Goldfarb    goldfarb@ocf.berkeley.edu
			R David Francis   francis@cis.ohio-state.edu
			Kate Schwartz     katie@eris.berkeley.edu

* What are some of the gay characters in comics?
	A short list for DC includes Mindy Meyer's brother (Wonder
Woman), Maggie Sawyer (Superman), Toby Gaines, Extrano, Ray Monde,
Pied Piper (Flash), perhaps Lightning Lass and Shrinking Violet 
(Legion of Superheroes). It has also been suggested that the Amazons 
in WW are gay to some extent.
	Marvel has Northstar, perhaps Mystique and Destiny.  (Note
from Sasha, sasha.bbs@cybernet.cse.fau.edu: "In Wolverine #51, it's
made subtly obvious that she, to use a Simpsonian euphamism,
'snuggled' with Wolvie.  This would suggest that she is, at the least,
bisexual.")
	Others include the women warriors in Epic's _Sisterhood of
Steel_, Barney (?) the unusually short person from Eclipse's _The
Masked Man_, the woman from _Detectives, Inc._, Robbie and Frank from
_Omaha_, and Terry, Pam, and George from _Zot!_.  Several characters 
are either gay or bi in _Love and Rockets_. _Desert Peach_ has a gay
main character, Erwin Rommel's (fictitious) younger brother.
	Many of the above are gays-written-by-straights and are of
questionable merit.  (If anyone wants to provide a list of gay comics,
on the other hand...)
			-Thanks on this one to, among others,
			Ian Lance Taylor  ian@airs.UUCP
			James Nicoll  jdnicoll@watyew.uwaterloo.ca
			Jonathan Burns  burns@latcs1.oz.au
			RD Francis  francis@cis.ohio-state.edu
			Elf Sternberg  halcyon!elf@sumax.seattleu.edu
			Damian Cugley  Damian.Cugley@prg.ox.ac.uk
			Corey Liss  cpl1@midway.uchicago.edu
			Rick Jones  albert@bcm.tmc.edu

* How old is Kitty Pryde (of Excalibur)?
	The short answer: Kitty was 13 1/2 when she joined the X-Men.
She had her 15th birthday in Excalibur #24.  Soren F. Peterson reports
that Claremont spoke at the Great Salt Lake Comics Convention during
the weekend of July 27-28, 1991 and stated without a shadow of a doubt
that Kitty Pryde is only 15.  Now, there's no *way* that only 18
months passed in the interim (too many events have occurred, and Kitty
has matured far more than 1.5 years-- email me for the complete
chronology).  But forget trying to make sense of it.  If Chris
Claremont can't keep track of Kitty's age, why should you?  Until the
writers retcon it, 15 it is.

* Who is the missing member of the Endless, in _Sandman_?

	Well.  There used to be huge debate/speculation on the subject
in rec.arts.comics, which had been summarized briefly in this space,
but the Sandman Special #1 finally revealed the name of the seventh
member of the Endless, thus ending (no pun intended) the suspense.
(The other six, by the way, are Destiny, Death, Dream, Desire,
Despair, and Delirium (formerly Delight).)
	His name is "Olethros".
	Or, for those not up to speed on their Greek, "Destruction".

* Where are the "real" locations of Metropolis, Gotham City, Hub City,
etc., in the DC Universe?

	Metropolis and Gotham City have been equated to *many*
different real-world cities over the years; there is no one correct
answer.  (Even if there were, the current writers are under no duress
to use it.)  Hub City, from _The Question_, is a bit different; it is
based on a combination of two cities in Illinois, one of which is
definitely East St. Louis.  (Email me for the expanded discussion.)
	Metropolis, as originally developed by Siegel and Schuster,
was probably Cleveland, the "big city" with which they were most
familiar.  Later, Superman's home was moved to the east coast (where
it's been located variously around Boston, in Rhode Island, in
Connecticut, as New York, and so on down to Washington).  _Who's Who
in the Legion of Superheroes_ showed a 30th century Metropolis, which
stretched slightly beyond New York and Boston in either direction, and
used those names explicitly in the description of Metropolis.  John Byrne
seemed to think it was back in the midwest.
	Gotham is definitely a port city, probably on the east coast;
too much plot has depended on that fact.  Again, various sources from
different comics (and the DC role-playing game) have placed Gotham
City all along the east coast, often near Metropolis.  I won't bother
with the details now.
	Frank Miller once claimed that, metaphorically, "Metropolis is
New York in the daytime, while Gotham is New York at night."  It's not
a bad way to think of the situation.
        Mayfair Games has published an Atlas of the DC Universe,
written by DC staffer Paul Kupperberg.  While not completely official,
it does jibe with locations that DC used when its house fanzine of the
mid-70s discussed this same question.  The locations given for the
main DC fictional cities are:
  Metropolis: Delaware
  Gotham City: New Jersey
  Star City: far nothern California
  Coast City: on 101 near Sausalito between San Francisco and Oakland
  Middleton (where J'onn J'Onzz first operated): suburb of Denver
  Littleville (Robby Reed): Wyoming
  Blue Valley (Kid Flash): northwest Nebraska, near South Dakota
  Central City/Keystone City: a bit north of Kansas City, Central is in
    Missouri while Keystone is in Kansas on the other side of the Mississippi
  Calvin City/Ivy Town (Atoms): both in Connecticut near New Haven
  Dos Rios (El Diablo): 65 miles south of San Antonio
  Fairfax (2nd Dial H for Hero): suburb of Bangor, Maine
  Midway City (Doom Patrol, Hawkman): Michigan, just east of Sault Ste. Marie
  Smallville: Kansas, 50 miles west of the I-70/I-35 interchange on I-70.
    The population is given as 90,000 btw.

* What happened to Calvin and Hobbes?
	Bill Watterson is again writing/drawing new strips, which
began printing on February 2, 1992.
	Previously he had been on sabbatical, busy "researching outer
space and other important things..."  (This comes from the Rocky
Mountain News, courtesy of Matt Telles, mattel@auto-trol.com.). In a
late note, Watterson is demanding that papers provide more space for
the Sunday strip when it returns, and some papers are planning on
dropping the strip.

* WHO IS Suicide Squid?
	For the best, most complete, and most fun answer, get the archived
discussion from theory.lcs.mit.edu.  It's in pub/wald/suicide-squid. Warning,
the file is quite large. If you want the short version, email tyg@eddie.mit.edu

* How can I get a Suicide Squid t-shirt?
        Yes, these really exist, and have excellent art of r.a.c.'s
favorite cephalopod by professional artist Ty Templeton. The shirts
met with universal praise by those who got them, and have even caused
people who aren't even on the net to ask where to get them. The first
run was completely sold, but it's likely that there'll be a second run
this spring. If you want to be sure of being notified if such comes to
pass, email tyg@eddie.mit.edu

*What's up with the First titles?
	Dark Horse has bought Nexus (for a *lot* of money by
independent comic company standards, according to Steve Rude, so don't
expect them to do this for very many other titles), and has given/sold
ownership of the character back to Baron & Rude. Current plans call
for a four issue Nexus miniseries by Baron & Rude each year.
	[Can someone fill me in on the current ownership status of
Badger, Grimjack, etc.?]
		Thanks to:
		csg194@cch.coventry.ac.uk (Morpheus)

* What's up with Grendel?
	The story behind Grendel's hiatus is that Comico went Chapter
11 and got bought out by some people who apparently have less than
sterling reputations among several creative types, including
creator/writer Matt Wagner.  Wagner believed that the transfer of
ownership nullified his contract with Comico; Comico claimed it
didn't. Having not seen the contract, it could go either way.  Anyway,
it's been tied up in legal stuff for a while.
	However, according to Million Year Picnic, a fairly well
regarded store in Cambridge, Dark Horse has obtained the rights to
Grendel and Mage and new work is forthcoming. The blurb said that new
Grendel could appear as soon as this summer (probably the
Batman/Grendel crossover since that's been finished for a while). No
new Mage for at least a year though.  (Apparently, Wagner wanted to
concentrate on Grendel for a while.)
	The Dark Horse representatives at a London convention at the
end of February 1992 announced three new Grendel projects: Warchild,
Grendel Tales, and The Hunter Rose Saga. Warchild should be out in
June/July, it's a ten or twelve issue series, and it looks very nice
indeed.
		Thanks to:
		tyg@hq.ileaf.com (Tom Galloway)
		csg194@cch.coventry.ac.uk (Morpheus)


[end of parts 0-2]

-	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	-
Feel free to send additions, corrections, suggestions, comments to:

Paul Andrew Estin
esti@midway.uchicago.edu  or  paul.estin@um.cc.umich.edu
Office: 330 Packard Rd.  Ann Arbor, MI 48104

and remember:
"There are no net.gods, just some people with bigger mouths than others."
	- Dan'l DanehyOakes, net.roach
Newsgroups: rec.arts.comics