From: tyg@HQ.Ileaf.COM (Tom Galloway)
Newsgroups: rec.arts.comics.info,rec.arts.comics
Subject: San Diego Comic Con news
Date: 21 Aug 92 13:10:35 GMT
Followup-To: rec.arts.comics.misc
Organization: Dartmouth College, Hanover, NH


Random comments/news from the San Diego Comics Con (in no particular order;
what most people will consider the major news is roughly in the middle here)

The reason there's not been any new 'Mazing Man for a while is that DeStefano
is doing background animation for Ren & Stimpy and is too busy with that (much
better paying) work to do stuff for comics.

Scott McCloud's book on comics, done in comics form, is due out early next
year from Tundra. Based on the presentation he did, this should be an
excellent book. My personal regret is that it won't be out for the winter
gift season as it looks to be the perfect gift for someone you know who
finds comics somewhat beneath them. McCloud said there'd already been
considerable interest in the book from academics.  He also said that while
he'll be returning to Zot! eventually, after he finishes the book in November
he has no idea what he'll decide to do next.

I asked Tom DeFalco about his comment during the Comico published,
Messner-Loebs written, Jonny Quest run that JQ was the one book that Marvel
wasn't publishing that he wished they did, given that presumably the rights
are available. Apparently the rights owners want a huge amount of money for
them. 

DC is negotiating with First to get the rights to do Grimjack and Badger.
Grimjack is fairly well advanced in negotiations, and looks pretty likely
to end up at DC barring unforeseen hangups.

I had a chance to read photocopies of Hulk #398 and 399 at the Marvel table.
Parts 2 and 3 of a 4 parter ending in 400, 399 is in my opinion right up
there with Peter David's best work. A very powerful issue with natural
dialogue and black humor.

DC and Image are in negotiations to do intercompany crossovers. No, I'm not
making this up, and yes, a common joke at the con was that the correct way to
do this would be for DC to provide the writing and Image the art. No further
word; rumor had it that this came about over drinks early in the con, making
me wonder where in San Diego one could obtain the Everclear Tang that must
have been being drunk.

Mr. Monster will be coming back in a mini-series from Tundra titled Mr.
Monster Attacks (similar to the Mars Attacks! cards in concept). There'll
be a Kelly mini-series afterwards, along with back-up stories about "Mr.
Monster's Temp From Hell, Babs" who replaces her (given that this is Mr.
Monster, I should state that Babs is not literally from Hell).

If you want to submit work as a writer to DC, well, first off your odds aren't
good. But if you still do, there are four families you shouldn't even consider
submitting anything about, whether it's main or supporting characters. These
are: Batman, Superman, Sandman, or Star Trek.

According to Jim Shooter, he's legally unable to talk about his separation
with Valiant unless it's in direct response to comments they make to the same
outlet. He's currently under a non-competition clause which lasts until
mid-October. At that point he'd like to either start up a new comic company or
take a position as a writer/packager with some other comics company.

The r.a.c. Black Ink Irregulars team of Jim Drew, myself, Roger Klorese, and
Dani Zweig won the trivia bowl despite a slow start including my blanking on
the name of John Constantine's band on the first question. We eventually fell
behind 50 to -5 in the first game, but staged a comeback. In the finals we
were never really seriously challenged. All team members wore Squid shirts,
as did some of our cheering section in the audience. We managed to restrain
ourselves from getting a fifth Squid shirt wearer to come up on stage so we
could do a ten tenacled wave.

DC's plan to have table staffers wear black armbands with an S symbol to
promote the upcoming "Death of Superman" storyline was cancelled due to the
death of Joe Shuster being so close to the con. Armbands will be polybagged
with Superman #75 though.

In case you were wondering, that purple robed figure in a recent New Titans
was indeed supposed to be Destiny, but permission wasn't granted by the
Sandman people to use him, thus the change in name.

The big news from the con though is something I'm still not clear on. There's
some kind of shake-up apparently going on at DC, which has definitely resulted
in the cancellation of GL:Mosaic, Justice Society (which should go through at
least #7 as that's what the creative staff are currently working on), and
Aquaman. Aquaman will be cancelled with #13, and Peter David's previously
scheduled Time and Tide arc (aka Aquaman: Year One, actually Year One Through
Year Twenty-Five) will now be a mini-series with a relaunch of Aquaman at #1
if sales are good.  There are a number of rumors floating around, but the
common gist seems to be that DC will be less "retro" in terms of books [read
more new characters, less revivals] and wants to make a serious push for
increased sales. Things should be, um, interesting over at the DC offices
for the next few months.

Saw the second part of the Two-Face animated Batman episode as well as bits
and pieces of several other episodes. This looks to be high quality stuff,
with reasonable writing and animation style (the animation itself ain't
up to Fleisher or Disney movies/shorts, but then it's also for 65 daily
episodes). Highly recommended. Also, not comics related, but the scenes
shown from Disney's next animated film, Aladdin, looked *very* nice, including
the showpiece song "Friend Like Me" featuring the Robin Williams genie (I'll
confess to a lingering fondness for Jim Backus from the Bugs Bunny version
though...) 

Met or remet a number of r.a.c.ers at the con and as always enjoyed doing so. 

Finally, the weekend ended on a somewhat strange note for me as I was waiting
for my flight back east from LAX. Several repeated pages for "Southwest
Airlines passenger Jack Kirby" were made just before my boarding.

"Welcome to College Bowel, the varsity sport of the gastro-intestinal tract" 
  --Bruce Baugh
tyg   tyg@hq.ileaf.com


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