Saturday, July 29, 2006
Tony Matta - Comicon
It was great to see the AK panel receiving so much publicity from Comicon. Daerick Gross, Marwan el-Nasher and new boy Tony Matta (of Violent Messiahs fame), amongst others, apparently gave an excellent run-down of the priorities for the company as it moves into full-frontal marketing in the US.
All four comics are now being published and distributed simultaneously in the US - we're up to issue 2 already.
The company is picking up on fan comments that the characters may be too americanised and this autumn the characters will set off in a new direction with stronger characterisation and with greater emphasis on Arabic culture.
Trade paperbacks may come later.
Daerick also apparently spoke about some of the difficulties of launching an overseas comic book company in the US, the problems of using a standardised Arabic in order to maximise coverage in the Middle East, and the tentative steps being taken in the Greek and Chinese markets by the company.
Sounds like a really interesting panel.
All four comics are now being published and distributed simultaneously in the US - we're up to issue 2 already.
The company is picking up on fan comments that the characters may be too americanised and this autumn the characters will set off in a new direction with stronger characterisation and with greater emphasis on Arabic culture.
Trade paperbacks may come later.
Daerick also apparently spoke about some of the difficulties of launching an overseas comic book company in the US, the problems of using a standardised Arabic in order to maximise coverage in the Middle East, and the tentative steps being taken in the Greek and Chinese markets by the company.
Sounds like a really interesting panel.
Wednesday, July 19, 2006
Libraries
Regular readers of this blog will be interested to know that ALL UK libraries have now signed up to a scheme where they will stock graphic novels. Hopefully, one day it will stock the planned Middle East Heroes trade paperback - that will help to promote the brand.
This is an incredible step forward for all comic book fans in the UK. UK libraries are completely free and you can borrow up to 20 books at a time.
My own local library has been stocking graphic novels for two years and currently has a stock of over 500 - so I can keep up to date with every new publication without having to shell out a single penny. Marvellous!
My own local library which is a good one also has just about every new movie DVD too and until recently stocked CDs - but has just decided to discontinue this as very few people have borrowed CDs in the last year. However, it has extended the DVD collection to include old TV series - everything from 77 sunset strip up to Veronica Mars - which I think is a great idea.
Personally, I've always felt we should extend the library concept even further - and as a member of my local library committee, I would welcome suggestions. Some people have already suggested bridal wear, party dresses and fashion accessories (necklaces, wristbands etc).
This is an incredible step forward for all comic book fans in the UK. UK libraries are completely free and you can borrow up to 20 books at a time.
My own local library has been stocking graphic novels for two years and currently has a stock of over 500 - so I can keep up to date with every new publication without having to shell out a single penny. Marvellous!
My own local library which is a good one also has just about every new movie DVD too and until recently stocked CDs - but has just decided to discontinue this as very few people have borrowed CDs in the last year. However, it has extended the DVD collection to include old TV series - everything from 77 sunset strip up to Veronica Mars - which I think is a great idea.
Personally, I've always felt we should extend the library concept even further - and as a member of my local library committee, I would welcome suggestions. Some people have already suggested bridal wear, party dresses and fashion accessories (necklaces, wristbands etc).
Sunday, July 09, 2006
Legs Weaver
Yatta!
Legs Weaver is an Italian descendent of Honey West - also heavily influenced by space opera - but that's simplifying things! The series is produced by Bonelli Editore, the greatest Italian publishing company, and has 119 issues which can be read as stand-alone adventures, although there are interesting plotlines that run through them.
What makes Legs, the tough and sexy special agent for Agenzia Alfa, a little bit different is that she is gay and her stunningly beautiful lipstick-model sidekick, May is bisexual.
But May is also more than just a sidekick - she also has a very strong backstory too - including once having been an art-thief.
The series is at its best in the first 70 issues with wide-ranging iconoclastic plots, action, genuine suspense (will Legs and May hold together?) and more than a little humour. The authors were given free range to place Legs in settings of their choice and to create atmospheres of their own choosing - the full naked creativity of Italian fumetti was released onto this one character- the outcome was a phenomenon. Travelling through those first 50 or so issues was a remarkable, life-changing experience. Four years of heaven. There is a tremendous brio about the whole thing. Issue 50 is one of the great classics of comic book literature.
Sadly, towards the end of its run, major changes in plot structure and the loss of May from the series, signalled the end and it eventually petered out a couple of years later. Bonelli Editore made some big mistakes around 2002-03. They developed a long-running and quite frankly boring plot involving a war between Earth and its colonies which lasted three years and stumbled across several different characters and eventually left them in a changed world which the new authors on the team struggled with. Legs ambience was completely changed and it failed dismally. Many readers of all Bonelli products were lost during those three years.
Sad - but luckily Bonelli is now recovering as a business and is moving neatly into animation with series like Martin Mystery.
You can find out more about Legs here:
http://www.geocities.com/area51/chamber/5834/
http://www.ubcfumetti.com/legsweaver/
Legs Weaver is an Italian descendent of Honey West - also heavily influenced by space opera - but that's simplifying things! The series is produced by Bonelli Editore, the greatest Italian publishing company, and has 119 issues which can be read as stand-alone adventures, although there are interesting plotlines that run through them.
What makes Legs, the tough and sexy special agent for Agenzia Alfa, a little bit different is that she is gay and her stunningly beautiful lipstick-model sidekick, May is bisexual.
But May is also more than just a sidekick - she also has a very strong backstory too - including once having been an art-thief.
The series is at its best in the first 70 issues with wide-ranging iconoclastic plots, action, genuine suspense (will Legs and May hold together?) and more than a little humour. The authors were given free range to place Legs in settings of their choice and to create atmospheres of their own choosing - the full naked creativity of Italian fumetti was released onto this one character- the outcome was a phenomenon. Travelling through those first 50 or so issues was a remarkable, life-changing experience. Four years of heaven. There is a tremendous brio about the whole thing. Issue 50 is one of the great classics of comic book literature.
Sadly, towards the end of its run, major changes in plot structure and the loss of May from the series, signalled the end and it eventually petered out a couple of years later. Bonelli Editore made some big mistakes around 2002-03. They developed a long-running and quite frankly boring plot involving a war between Earth and its colonies which lasted three years and stumbled across several different characters and eventually left them in a changed world which the new authors on the team struggled with. Legs ambience was completely changed and it failed dismally. Many readers of all Bonelli products were lost during those three years.
Sad - but luckily Bonelli is now recovering as a business and is moving neatly into animation with series like Martin Mystery.
You can find out more about Legs here:
http://www.geocities.com/area51/chamber/5834/
http://www.ubcfumetti.com/legsweaver/
Saturday, July 08, 2006
Modesty Blaise
One of the characters that may have been influenced by Honey West was Modesty Blaise. Created by Peter O'Donnell in 1962, Modesty Blaise was a comic strip rather than a comic book and was essential reading first thing in the morning for every spotty teenage boy like myself in the 1960s!
You can find out more here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Modesty_Blaise
As well as the comic strips, there have been novels and movies. The first starred the beautiful Monica Vitti but was a little too European for most British tastes. Too later movies were both poorly constructed and she deserves better. Quentin Tarantino has expressed an interest in the character and so has Nicole Kidman, so provided Quentin moves quickly (Nicole is now 40+), this could be something special.
You can find out more here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Modesty_Blaise
As well as the comic strips, there have been novels and movies. The first starred the beautiful Monica Vitti but was a little too European for most British tastes. Too later movies were both poorly constructed and she deserves better. Quentin Tarantino has expressed an interest in the character and so has Nicole Kidman, so provided Quentin moves quickly (Nicole is now 40+), this could be something special.
Thursday, July 06, 2006
Honey West
One friend of Jalila would almost certainly be Honey West - the fast-talking, leather-clad private eye invented by GG Fickling - husband-and-wife team - in the 1950s. Honey spawned a first-class TV series starrting Anne Francis in the early 1960s and it is almost certainly time for a Honey movie surely.
Honey was the inspiration for later characters suchg as Emma Peel of the Avengers and Modesty Blaise of the Daily Mail - perhaps even Legs Weaver, the long-running Italian comic book series.
You can find out more about Honey here:
http://www.thrillingdetective.com/honey.html
The Honey West novels have just started being reissues - the first two on sale are 'This Girl For Hire' and 'Kiss for a Killer'. They both have great plots, full of intriguing twists and turns and capture the optimistic world of the early 60s with great style and bite. You can order them from your local bookstore or through Amazon.
Honey was the inspiration for later characters suchg as Emma Peel of the Avengers and Modesty Blaise of the Daily Mail - perhaps even Legs Weaver, the long-running Italian comic book series.
You can find out more about Honey here:
http://www.thrillingdetective.com/honey.html
The Honey West novels have just started being reissues - the first two on sale are 'This Girl For Hire' and 'Kiss for a Killer'. They both have great plots, full of intriguing twists and turns and capture the optimistic world of the early 60s with great style and bite. You can order them from your local bookstore or through Amazon.
Tuesday, July 04, 2006
Summer Competition Winner - Ahriman
Thanks to everyone who entered the summer competition - the quality of all the entries was absolutely fantastic - every single one was amazing!! The strength of the imaginations of children never ceases to amaze me - so in a way it is with some sadness that we have to choose a winner, because everyone deserves a prize on this one.
But the winner we've chosen was applauded not just by me and the teacher who helped lead this particular workshop - but also by all the other kids in the class, so in some ways, I think this is probably a fair result.
So, stand forward Charity Love (yes, that's her real name!) who gave us: The Legion!
The Legion protect the Black Stone of Obsidian, a rectangular marble-like stone. A source of energy that emits the power of love, peace and happiness thoughout the world. The Legion are the result of a genetic experiment. There are 10,000 of them. They are all identical. Half of them are men and half of them are women. They have enhanced abilities - partly-psychic and partly-physical. They have been scattered throughout space and time, so adventures can take place anywhere at any time (great for an ongoing series!). They believe the purpose of life is to create harmony from chaos.
The Black Stone is always under attack from The Snake. The Snake is evil, hate and chaos. It is partly-physical, exploding into the physical world in the shape of a thin 500-mile long underground snake that lives beneath the surface of the earth and burrows through the mud and rock often popping up in the middle of the night in teenage girls' bedrooms(!); partly temporal - it can weave through the folds of time and appear in different times at the same time, so to speak - and partly psychic, it can burrow into the minds of men leaving behind eggs that grow into psychic worms, creating temptation and sick and evil thoughts - or sometimes just discord and depression, unhappiness, fear and anger.
The Snake is trying to capture the Stone for Ahriman, a great sorceror who lived at the dawn of time. He has progressed beyond the human frame into a world of ideas, archetypes and thoughts. He wishes to consume the Black Stone psychically, draining it of its energy - in a way that you might drain a peach of its juice. Ahriman is pure evil and he wishes to consume all the good in the world. But what is evil? With Ahriman, it is simply a belief. He believes harmony is unnatural and that chaos is what entropy teaches us is the natural order of things. When entropy is complete, only then will the universe find true peace. To Ahriman, it is the Stone that is corrupt.
And then there is the mysterious Zurvan - a Being so abstract that he is as far removed from Ahriman, the Snake, or the Legion and the Stone - as these creatures are from us. Zurvan is amoral and his purpose is unknown. Is it possible that he has created the universe and everything in it simply to experiment with his ideas of Platonic concepts such as Love, Evil, Chaos and Order? Or does he have another purpose that the series will slowly unveil?
Isn't that amazing? Charity is just fourteen years old! Isn't that just a bit scary? And she looks such a normal, sweet and innocent little thing - with all these thoughts floating around in her head!! Well done, Charity - you have some truly amazing concepts here!
Stand by for an announcement for a great new autumn competition coming soon from AK Comics UK!
But the winner we've chosen was applauded not just by me and the teacher who helped lead this particular workshop - but also by all the other kids in the class, so in some ways, I think this is probably a fair result.
So, stand forward Charity Love (yes, that's her real name!) who gave us: The Legion!
The Legion protect the Black Stone of Obsidian, a rectangular marble-like stone. A source of energy that emits the power of love, peace and happiness thoughout the world. The Legion are the result of a genetic experiment. There are 10,000 of them. They are all identical. Half of them are men and half of them are women. They have enhanced abilities - partly-psychic and partly-physical. They have been scattered throughout space and time, so adventures can take place anywhere at any time (great for an ongoing series!). They believe the purpose of life is to create harmony from chaos.
The Black Stone is always under attack from The Snake. The Snake is evil, hate and chaos. It is partly-physical, exploding into the physical world in the shape of a thin 500-mile long underground snake that lives beneath the surface of the earth and burrows through the mud and rock often popping up in the middle of the night in teenage girls' bedrooms(!); partly temporal - it can weave through the folds of time and appear in different times at the same time, so to speak - and partly psychic, it can burrow into the minds of men leaving behind eggs that grow into psychic worms, creating temptation and sick and evil thoughts - or sometimes just discord and depression, unhappiness, fear and anger.
The Snake is trying to capture the Stone for Ahriman, a great sorceror who lived at the dawn of time. He has progressed beyond the human frame into a world of ideas, archetypes and thoughts. He wishes to consume the Black Stone psychically, draining it of its energy - in a way that you might drain a peach of its juice. Ahriman is pure evil and he wishes to consume all the good in the world. But what is evil? With Ahriman, it is simply a belief. He believes harmony is unnatural and that chaos is what entropy teaches us is the natural order of things. When entropy is complete, only then will the universe find true peace. To Ahriman, it is the Stone that is corrupt.
And then there is the mysterious Zurvan - a Being so abstract that he is as far removed from Ahriman, the Snake, or the Legion and the Stone - as these creatures are from us. Zurvan is amoral and his purpose is unknown. Is it possible that he has created the universe and everything in it simply to experiment with his ideas of Platonic concepts such as Love, Evil, Chaos and Order? Or does he have another purpose that the series will slowly unveil?
Isn't that amazing? Charity is just fourteen years old! Isn't that just a bit scary? And she looks such a normal, sweet and innocent little thing - with all these thoughts floating around in her head!! Well done, Charity - you have some truly amazing concepts here!
Stand by for an announcement for a great new autumn competition coming soon from AK Comics UK!
Monday, July 03, 2006
Aya - Great Holiday
Yes thanks to all of you who asked, I had a great holiday.
But now, it's also great to be back manning the UK office of the world's no.1 comic book company - AK Comics.
When I arrived back, I found the latest issue of Aya waiting for me - and what a knock-out issue it is too - you cannot afford to miss this one - it's the origins issue for Aya and it's written by the ace creative talent at AK - Ayman Kandeel, Marwan el-Nasher and Sara Kareem - and it has absolutely everything!
I won't issue a spoiler by telling you too much about the plot - but suffice it to say that we don't only have the origin of Aya but also a very interesting new character. Also, we get to see the evil Axes at work infiltrating and silently corrupting society in order to maximise its own power. And if all that wasn't enough, we also meet their very interesting henchmen - Donga, One-Bullet and the very sexy Kamikaze - I want to read her backstory too sometime - I think we have another Catwoman in the making here.
The artwork by Jheremy Raapack is fantastic - the detail extraordinary - and he is ably assisted by Rafael Kras.
You can order Aya through comic book stores in the UK and USA or by subscription from www.akcomics.com
But now, it's also great to be back manning the UK office of the world's no.1 comic book company - AK Comics.
When I arrived back, I found the latest issue of Aya waiting for me - and what a knock-out issue it is too - you cannot afford to miss this one - it's the origins issue for Aya and it's written by the ace creative talent at AK - Ayman Kandeel, Marwan el-Nasher and Sara Kareem - and it has absolutely everything!
I won't issue a spoiler by telling you too much about the plot - but suffice it to say that we don't only have the origin of Aya but also a very interesting new character. Also, we get to see the evil Axes at work infiltrating and silently corrupting society in order to maximise its own power. And if all that wasn't enough, we also meet their very interesting henchmen - Donga, One-Bullet and the very sexy Kamikaze - I want to read her backstory too sometime - I think we have another Catwoman in the making here.
The artwork by Jheremy Raapack is fantastic - the detail extraordinary - and he is ably assisted by Rafael Kras.
You can order Aya through comic book stores in the UK and USA or by subscription from www.akcomics.com
