Posted by Michael Pinto on Nov 17, 2009 in Comic Books
I never took superheroes seriously — there’s just something so silly to me about a grown man running around town in his pajamas fighting evil. But I think that’s why I like Invincible #68 so much. The entire issue is silly, and better yet you’ve got the superhero engaged some very highly animated combat with a dinosaur. Featuring a story by Robert Kirkman and some entertaining artwork by Ryan Ottley and Fco Plascencia this issue will be out on November 18th, 2009: Read more…
Posted by Michael Pinto on Nov 16, 2009 in Comic Books
I admit that I overlooked the first issue of Fall Out Toy Works because it’s based on the lyrics of Fall Out Boy. And why do I hate Fall Out Boy? Because in my humble opinion the only band in the universe that should have the name Fall in is THE Fall — the amazing post-punk project of Mark E. Smith. Well now that I’ve gotten that out of the way, I hate to admit it but this looks like a great book! I’m not an emo fan but Sami Basri, Sunny Gho and Imaginary Friends Studios have done a great job with the artwork which is a treat to the eyes: Read more…
This film takes fandom and cosplay to the next level: Based upon the comic book by Mark Millar and John Romita Jr. it tells the story of a teen who decides to become a real life superhero sans super powers. Methinks that bit of realism might actually make this film a bit of fun. Here are some posters from the film: Read more…
Posted by Michael Pinto on Nov 13, 2009 in Comic Books
This illustration by manga artist Hisashi Eguchi got my attention right away as the Christmas attired anime lady is sporting a vintage Devo cap. The drawing was created for a flyer promoting a Christmas concert in Japan which features the the musician Naoki Yamamoto (who is also works in the anime industry) and the hardcore band Surorana. Here is the illustration at full size (just click on the drawing): Read more…
Posted by Michael Pinto on Nov 11, 2009 in Comic Books
Introduction: The graphic novel One Model Nation will come out at the end of November and as fans of both comic books and music we throughly enjoyed this book which takes place in an alternate universe version of Berlin in 1977. We were lucky to get an interview with Donovan Leitch, the official historian of this tale who collaborated with writer Courtney Allbritton Taylor and artist Jim Rugg to bring this illustrated rock epic to life. Read more…
It’s amazing to think that Buck Rogers got started as a fictional character in an issue of Amazing Stories from over 90 years ago (August 1928 to be exact) — however Buck made his first huge mark as a comic strip series illustrated by John Flint Dille. Those old strips have a wonderfully quirky look to them, and the folks at Dark Horse have picked on this by introducing a line of swag which was designed by the folks at Retro-A-Go-Go. The collection goes on sale on February 24th, 2010 and includes a wide range of goodies including picture frames: Read more…
Posted by Michael Pinto on Nov 9, 2009 in Comic Books
As a New Yorker I’d always assumed that 9/11 was the definitive defining moment of America in the 21st Century — but now I’m wondering if the flooding of New Orleans was maybe just as important if not more so. My thinking is that while for the most part NYC has picked up as a city and has gone that New Orleans is never coming back. Yes it may still be there in a small way, but it will never be a major city again. In terms of the psyche of America this is huge as that city was unique and pre-dated the United States itself. So it’s interesting to see this topic spread out from documentaries into the world of fiction. So Nola #1 caught my eye, and it’s worth taking a closer look at. Read more…
Posted by Michael Pinto on Nov 7, 2009 in Comic Books
365 Samurai and a Few Bowls of Rice looks like a wonderful combination of the storytelling skills of Akira Kurosawa mixed with a Jamie Hewlett look with just a dash of RAW magazine from the 80s. The artist behind this graphic novel is J. P. Kalonji a self taught illustrator who lives in Switzerland. Here’s an amazing 36 page sample from this beautiful book which is nearly 400 pages and will be published by Dark Horse Comics on December 2nd: Read more…
Posted by Michael Pinto on Nov 5, 2009 in Comic Books
This short video clip shows underground comics legend R. Crumb talking about his latest book which is an illustrated version of the Book of Genesis (the full interview is here). The lady interviewing Crumb is Francoise Mouly, the art editor for the New Yorker magazine. Mouly while not being the slickest interviewer is a comics legend herself since back in the day she co-founded RAW with Art Spiegelman.
Shown above is the beautiful cover for Star Wars: Invasion #5 by illustrator Jo Chen which comes out today. What I really love about the folks who license Star Wars is that they allow their artists a high degree of creative freedom to work within the brand and they always seem to pull of a high level of quality. So if you didn’t know that the cover was a Star Wars anything you’d still be impressed with it; to me that says so much about how much they care about the product. Below are a few of the interior pages by Colin Wilson which also look great — there’s no bait-and-switch which you see all the time with other titles: Read more…
Posted by Michael Pinto on Nov 3, 2009 in Comic Books
Sky Pirates of Neo Terra #2 will be out on Wednesday and the previews for this issue look grand! All the art in this series by Image Comics is by Camilla D’Errico and she gives her all to each page. Her style owes a great deal to anime, but if you look a bit further you’ll see other influences at work. I also love the use of lighting in each panel, and on top of that D’Errico palette does a nice job of contrasting subtle pastel colors with just a splash of more vivid colors here and there: Read more…
The December issue of HyperHobby magazine has a special treat for old school anime fanboys: A special supplement cover that features Cyborg 009! For those of you who may not know it Cyborg 009 started as a manga in 1964, there was an anime film in 1966 and a series in 1968 but the 1979 anime series really put the show on the map. Here’s the black-and-white intro from the first series, which still hold up pretty well: Read more…
Posted by Michael Pinto on Oct 30, 2009 in Comic Books
After months of looking at preview art I’m happy to see that The Marvelous Land Of Oz #1 will be hitting comic book shops next Wednesday. It was an act of bravery for Marvel to not only tackle such a well known property — but to bring in illustrator Skottie Young to do it. What I also love is that Marvel isn’t doing the old bait-and-switch where Skottie does an amazing cover and the insides of the book are done by a lesser talent in a hurry. The inside of Oz is 100% Skottie and I like what I’m seeing here: Read more…
Posted by Michael Pinto on Oct 29, 2009 in Comic Books
For the October 29th release of Weekly Shonen Champion the publication features a nice illustration of Tezuka standing next to his manga creation Black Jack. This is the 80th year of Tezuka’s birth (born on November 3, 1928) which nicely fit in with the 40th anniversary of the magazine: Read more…
Editor’s Introduction: Journalist Amber Love shared with us these touching photos of Wonder Woman Day which took place this past weekend. The event took place in both Portland and New Jersey — these photos are from the Jersey event which was hosted at Comic Fusion. To me the folks in these photos are the real superheroes — fans and pros like yourselves coming together to pitch in for a good cause. By the way in these photos you’ll see several shots of Joe Sinnott — the man is a living legend of comics, if you don’t know him do yourself a huge favor and check out his bio and you’ll be amazed at his life story. Read more…
Kazuo Umezu (楳図 かずお) is the the godfather of the Japanese horror manga genre. A new film has been released in Japan which profiles the author/artist who got his start in 1962 and is still active. Umezu is best known for such works as The Drifting Classroom, Makoto-chan and Reptilia. The Drifting Classroom was turned into a live action film in 1987. Here are some samples of his wonderfully gothic work: Read more…
Posted by Michael Pinto on Oct 24, 2009 in Comic Books
There are two things I love about this cover for Marvel Divas #4 by Jelena Kevic-Djurdjevic: First the coloring is wonderfully done, but more amazing yet our divas aren’t forced to be clad in bikinis when fighting those devilish looking creatures! Granted the Marvel Divas look slightly supermodel thin, but this feels like an improvement from other covers I tend to see. Read more…
For the fourth year in a row Portland, Oregon will celebrate Wonder Woman Day and use the day to raise funds for three local domestic violence prevention-intervention agencies. The popularity of the day has inspired Stacy Korn, co-owner of Comic Fusion in New Jersey to do an east coast event by having local artists do sketches for charity. I have to say that I love the idea of taking Wonder Woman who is an icon of strength and equality — and using her to raise awareness for a good cause: Read more…
Posted by Michael Pinto on Oct 21, 2009 in Comic Books
Shown above is the cover for Marvel Adventures Spider-Man #59 by Skottie Young which is due out in January. I never get tired of looking at Skottie’s work, it always pops out from the pack every time I see the Marvel previews. I like the fact that by taking a cartoony approach with the classic Marvel characters that he’s able to give them some personality that you never see in the more serious action packed and over photoshoped covers you see elsewhere.
Back in the day my friend Ardith Carlton (who now lives in Japan) would keep telling us about this amazing anime series called Tomorrow’s Joe (あしたのジョ) which she claimed at the time was one of THE best anime series of all time. Of course none of us believed her because the subject matter in the show was boxing and this being the 80s our obsessions at the time were giant robots and cool looking spaceships and of course Joe offered none of that. Little did we know what a cool series that we were missing out on! Ashita no Jō is now seen as one of the heavyweights of its genre. And in celebration of the series Kaitendoh is releasing a huge 1/6th scale collectable statuette which will come out in December: Read more…
As a fanboy I thought that the tech sector could get a bit catty at times (example: TechCrunch 50 vs. Demo) but that’s nothing compared to what just went down today in comic book fandom! The leading comic con in NYC is the New York Comic Con which is produced by Reed Exhibitions — the show has been building up huge momentum these past few years. And while it’s not as huge as the San Diego Comic Con, it dominates the Javits Center. Read more…
Galactica to me was always a Diet Coke to a Star Wars chocolate shake. Not only was it a bad rip off, but it wasn’t even in the same category. But like a chubby kid with a sweet tooth for sci fi I drank it by the gallon back in the day and watched every damn episode. But even with a sweet tooth you hit a limit and for me that was the travesty called Galactica: 1980. Now those fancy producers who reimagined Galactica knew this; so they beat every bit of cheese out of the show they could find. Suddenly Galactica seemed to have more in common with Blade Runner. But like a dork trying to act cool, sooner or later the inner lame will manifest — and I’m proud to announce that with issue #2 of the Galactica: 1980 the franchise has jumped the shark for good: Read more…
Posted by Michael Pinto on Oct 11, 2009 in Comic Books
Starting this month the Japanese book publisher Kodansha will publish a series of paperbacks titled The Complete Works of Tezuka which will include every manga that Osamu Tezuka created. The books will be published on a monthly basis and the series starts off with Astro Boy, future editions will include Jungle Emperor (Kimba the White Lion), Princess Knight, W3 and Pinocchio: Read more…
On this day in 1968 the French erotic science fiction film Barbarella was released in the United States. The film failed on pretty much every level as the critics hated it and it made no money at the box office, however thanks to the wonders of home video Barbarella became a cult hit in 1977 when it was re-released. Read more…
Back in the day my friend Ardith Carlton (who now lives in Japan) would keep telling us about this amazing anime series called 
As a fanboy I thought that the tech sector could get a bit catty at times (example: TechCrunch 50 vs. Demo) but that’s nothing compared to what just went down today in comic book fandom! The leading comic con in NYC is the 
