I have so many pictures in my laptop that it’s impossible to get everything loaded and into a post. But, I might as well chip away at the stack. The reason most of you come to my site is because of the pictures (I have about 4,000 loaded already), so I figure I should share as many as I can. Here are a few items I picked up at Comic-Cons past.
Charles Vess’ Book of Ballads and Sagas
Charles Vess has beautiful fantasy artwork and I have several comics with his work. So, I was really happy to see him at a table and chatted him up a bit. Charles was giving away a preview of his then-upcoming personal project so I snagged one. It’s a thin, full-size, black-and-white promo that contains a couple of pages from a story written by Neil Gaiman and illustrated by Charles. What gorgeous stuff.
Geoff Darrow’s Shaolin Cowboy
Geoff has done several projects for other people, but this is a solo comic book he’s created, co-written and illustrated. Shaolin Cowboy is a weird bit of science fiction-fantasy-western-dystopian-post-apocalyptic-drug-addled-European-comix-inspired comic book fun by one of the most detailed artists in the industry. Just the art alone is a viable reason to buy this book. It’s too bad Geof hasn’t made this story an on-going thing. Here’s a print we bought form him a few years back. He added a little sketch of the monk’s head on the lower right corner.
Here’s a close up of a quick sketch Geof did when I was buying the print.
Here’s what the published artwork looked like.
Instant Piano
Instant Piano was an anthology project put out by Dark Horse Comics (which I’ve always considered to be the HBO of comic books) that took some of the most inventive yet less well known creators and gave them free reign to write and draw some short stories. The following promo sheet was handed out at a table where all of them were signing stuff. I was already a big fan of Evan Dorkin’s Milk and Cheese, and Kyle Baker’s art on The Shadow (which was a series of very good stories but also a hilarious send-up of the Howard Chaykin mini-series). The other artists were: Mark Badger, Robbie Busch, and Stephen DeStefano. Funny story: All the guys to sketched and signed the sheet. Kyle Baker was last. He said something to the effect that I should buy the book because it was going to be the greatest thing ever. I kind of chuckled. He shot me back a dirty look and said something like “It IS! Why are you laughing.” I smiled, picked up my promo sheet, and hurried away. I’m embarrassed to say I haven’t actually bought the books. Hmm. Add those to my list.
And here’s your bonus: the covers to the Instant Piano Comics mini-series.
Whomever put Axel back together again after his experience with the man-eating plant had a twisted idea of what an appropriate cyborg configuration ought to be. He was equipped with a chest button that, when pushed, gave him a powerful orgasm. The ecstasy of the experience left him incapable of functioning, so the button was actually more of a hindrance than a benefit … well, at least in battle. When he wasn’t catatonic from his rapture, many died at the slice of the cleaver which was also provided in his corporeal rebuild.
This last image is just flat out lazy. What’s the message? That extremism breeds extremism? That loony Christians are fronts for the KKK? That Kirk Cameron legally changed his name to born Kirk Kyle Kameron? Ah, nuts. We spent the time making it, so here it is anyway.
As I was driving home last night, I thought about Amazing Spider-man #50 and it reminded me of the 
In creating this list, I excluded black and white since someone told me those aren’t really colors. I guess that depends on semantics but we’ll go with that. Also, since gray is supposed to be the combination of black and white, I’ll assume it isn’t a color either. So, if that’s the case, then this is a Top 7 List. To be perfectly clear, these are the only seven colors guys recognize. Anything in between is just lighter or darker or more this or less that.
2. Green: The color of money. The color of my lawn after I remember to water it. The color of the traffic light I like best. The color of dragons.
3. Red: The color of blood and power ties. The color of the traffic light I just barely sneaked under. The color of the flowers I forgot to get my wife on Valentine’s Day until that night.
4. Brown: The color of dirt. The color of crap. The color of dress shoes, if they aren’t black. There are no other colors for dress shoes. Cordovan is not an acceptable variant for real guys. We’re not sure if brown shoes are a good color with a blue suit. We’ll gamble and stick with black. Black isn’t a color so we’re probably OK.
5. Orange: The color of construction workers’ vests. The color of a fruit that should be eaten in big chunks with your hands because who eats an orange in little slices?
6. Yellow: The color of dudes that are cowards. The color of piss and beer. The color of the traffic light that is on way too often when I’m just about to go through an intersection. If we get busted, blue is no longer going to be at the top of the list.
7. Pink: The color of the flowers I got on Valentine’s Day night when I remembered on my way home from work that I needed to get flowers. It’s the cheaper color for flowers compared to red flowers. It’s also the color that got me into trouble because my wife knows pink flowers are cheaper and she thought I thought she wasn’t worth springing the extra bucks for. But, it’s still a color chicks like and put all over girly stuff and we only know about it because we like to hang around them. We mean the chicks, not their stuff. Guys hate this color.
We were flipping through old independent comics from Eclipse and First tonight and came across a couple of Dave Stevens illustrated comics. Dave was an instant hero of ours when we first discovered his Rocketeer stories in Pacific and Eclipse Comics way back in the day. His illustrations were steeped in the 1940s era of cars, speech and mannerisms, story telling, and art.
If you’re not familiar with Dave Stevens because you’re too young, let’s just say he was Adam Hughes well before Adam Hughes was Dave Stevens. Whatever that means. Dave died of leukemia at 52 years of age in 2008 but left behind a legacy of art that was clearly unique in style. Even if the art didn’t contain any of his sexy girls, one could recognize his fine pen strokes and his fantastic use of shadow. We only wish he had done a bunch of additional Rocketeer stuff before he got bored with it.
At a Comic-Con a few years ago, we meandered around the artist area and stumbled on Peter Kuper‘s shingle. If you don’t know him, Peter is one of the primary artists that illustrates Spy vs. Spy for Mad Magazine. He’s also a contributor to various news magazines like Time, Newsweek, and Businessweek, and he has illustrated for newspapers like The New York Times. Peter’s non-comic artwork is typically cerebral in nature so it was interesting to leaf through his original art and prints. He has a unique style that combines spray paint and stencils. Recently, however, he decided it wasn’t such a good idea to use aerosol paint since some of his subject matter involves environmental responsibility. So, we assume he must be using discarded Denny’s crayons. That’s what we would do.
We found a piece of unpublished art titled “Population Explosion” that reminded us of that period in Thailand years ago and decided it was still a good representation of our anxieties and political bent. So, we bought it. Here it is for your viewing pleasure.
Time for a new Asterix review. We’re up to Asterix and the Chieftain’s Shield. The story starts out with a narration of the defeat of Vercingetorix, the mighty chieftain who united Gaul but ultimately succumbed to the Roman forces. In the comic’s next scene, the chieftain’s shield is shown lying forgotten at the place where Vercingetorix dropped his arms in front of Caesar. A legionary absconded with the icon, loses it to a legionary in a game of chance, who in turn loses it to centurion, who in turn trades it for some Gaulish wine in a pub. This is the prelude.
Six from Sirius, created and written by Doug Moench and illustrated by Paul Gulacy was a 4-issue mini-series published by Epic Comics in 1984. The story is self-contained outside any of the other universes in the comic book publishing houses. The story centers around a group of six agents of an intergalactic governmental organization. It’s kind of like a spy story in space.
Roger Moore is three years older than Sean Connery and looked as old as his age in 1983. On the other hand, Sean managed to look like a James Bond that is only slightly past his prime. There are several references to Bond’s age throughout the film but that doesn’t stop him from salacious behavior and serious fighting ability.
Klaus Maria Brandauer as Maximilian Largo is brilliant, suave, irrationally jealous, and totally off his rocker with heady megalomania. Klaus’ Largo was just about as opposite as possible from Adolfo Celi’s Largo from Thunderball. We’re glad for that. Both were excellent in their own right. Loved him!
We mentioned in another post that Luciana Paluzzi’s Fiona was one of our favorite villains. She was a perfect femme fatale because she wasn’t affected by Bond’s charms. It’s the same with Fatima Blush (Barbara Carerra), albeit with a refreshingly distinct persona just like Brandauer’s Largo. Barbara plays Fatima fantastically as a certified malevolent nut job. Unlike a lot of Bond villainesses, Fatima is extremely unpredictable and dangerous.
The Bad: The only obvious casting misstep was Kim Basinger as Domino Petachi. Kim’s Domino has no mystique, whereas Thunderball’s Domino (acted by Claudine Auger) looked the part. We like Kim well enough (she is a rather fetching woman, after all), but this role could have been played by someone more compatible with the look the name invokes, like, oh let’s see, how about someone that’s actually Italian.
It is a British Crown Dependency. We’re not exactly sure what that means, but apparently that means the residents can do some self-governing but are also responsible for paying taxes to support the dental care of the royal family. By the way, the island only came to be about 8,500 years ago as glaciers melted during the Mesolithic period.
The awesome flag of the BCD is a runner up on our list of the 
There are an awful lot of grey sky days. The average amount of blue sky during any given day is only about a third of the total. This is why the sale of tanning salons ranks 4th globally. There is an occasional red sky when the blood of the long-dead Manx Lamb boils up from the bowels of the sea rising to warn that the Spirit of the Lamb will soon reclaim its home. We just made that up. We do assume the occasional sunset does make the sky reddish, though.
Gambling is allowed. There is a casino in Douglas (the capital city) attached to a Best Western hotel. Yeah, you heard right. A Best Western. Apparently there are lots of them in the UK. That’s like going to Reno, Nevada and being served fish & chips and warm beer. Well, there’s a McDonald’s in New Delhi, so why not a Best Western on the Isle, we suppose.
The beach front in Douglas is hideous. There really isn’t anything more to say about that but we’re trying to get our pictures to line up and we need a few more lines of text. So we need some filler. Here goes: The Isle of Man’s temperature barely peaks over 60 degrees Fahrenheit (that’s less than 20 degrees Celsius). OK, that should be good enough.
The island is snuggled between Northern Ireland and England. Motorists drive on the left. The island-country is not part of the British Commonwealth and is not a member of the European Union. There is an airport but most transport is done by ferry. It takes about five hours to go from the capital to Liverpool, England. It takes about four hours to get to Belfast, North Ireland. And now you know.
The island has the only non-smoking prison in Europe. There is speculation that criminals fear ending up in the island’s penal system and that this fear contributes to a lower crime rate. Who wants to go to a prison where an inmate can’t suck on some fags? (That means something 
Injebreck Reservoir, about 3000′ in length at capacity, runs along Baldwin (a road), right in the center of the island. It’s pretty but don’t let it fool you. When it was drained in 2002, the carcass of a strange amphibian about the size of a right whale was found at the bottom. Apparently, Nessie from Loch Ness left Scotland several years ago to get away from the tourists. She didn’t know that Injebreck had been used for underwater nuclear bomb testing in the 1950s.
The native Manx cat is a tailless breed specifically designed to avoid the problems associated with getting its tail caught in the door on its way out to do its business or kill rodents and birds. Incidentally, a Manx cat with evil powers figures into a mini-series with one of our favorite characters, Grimjack. We haven’t read it. Maybe now we are thinking we should. Perhaps we will. Maybe we’ll pick up copies of the story at the Comic-Con this year. Maybe.
The island has become a hub for space tourism. Don’t know why. Don’t care to research that. But if you want to look down upon everybody else (literally and figuratively), pony up a few million and get thee to the upper atmosphere.
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