Wednesday, July 7, 2010

The Hood in Little Red Riding Hood

I read Legends: The Enchanted

I posted a review at the Comic Book Bin.


Jane Wiedlin and Bill Morrison's Lady Robotika Approaches

JANE WIEDLIN AND BILL MORRISON'S LADY ROBOTIKA COMIC BOOK NOW AVAILABLE FOR PRE-ORDER

New Sneak Peek Revealed of Jane's Ultra-Galactic, Sexy Cyborg Revolutionist Alter-Ego

With two weeks to go until the street date of Lady Robotika: Slaveship to the Stars, issue #1 in the debut of the comic book series created by Bill Morrison and Jane Wiedlin, the creators today release a sneak preview of some of the key concept art from the book, and announce the pre-sale of the debut issues. Published by Shadowline and Image Comics, Lady Robotika touches down on July 14 at comic stores nationwide. To find a comic shop near you, please visit www.comicshoplocator.com.

Today's announcement includes the introduction of some of the characters keeping Lady Robotika company, including E'Death: Herron IV's sadistic prison warden, the Iron Maidens: E'death's lethal squad of guards, and Emperor Yecchh: the Supreme Ruler of planet Herron IV. The exclusive concept art gallery can be viewed here: http://www.ladyrobotika.com/blog/the-gallery/concept-art/.

Lady Robotika is a full-color 32-page comic, the brainchild of legendary Go-Go's guitarist Jane Wiedlin ("Our Lips Are Sealed"), and Bill Morrison, Eisner Award-winning creative behind The Simpsons Comics, Futurama Comics, Roswell, Little Green Man and Heroes Anonymous, with an art assist from Tone Rodriquez and Jeffrey Moy. Earthly rock star Jane Wiedlin is abducted by a rock 'n roll-loving evil alien emperor, and implanted with nanobots meant to enslave her. His plans backfire as our guitar-slinging heroine learns to control the nanites and transforms into the super-powered cyborg galactic liberator Lady Robotika! With sexy sci-fi rock and roll space adventures to ensue...

Mat Broome to Announce 2 New Projects

COMICS CREATOR & VIDEO GAME ART DIRECTOR MAT BROOME TO ANNOUNCE TWO NEW PROJECTS AT SAN DIEGO COMIC-CON

At the 2010 Comic-Con International in San Diego, comics creator and Sony Art Director Mat Broome will be on-hand to showcase the first glimpse at two new innovative projects. The first announcement is of a new creator-owned comic series, following in the footsteps of his last creator-owned series The End League with Rick Remender. Broome's second announcement will be of an innovative online start-up that will bring together the top creative minds of comics, video games, film, television and music. These two projects underscore a revitalized creative effort by Broome that has been years in the making.

"I've been absent from the San Diego Comic Convention for years since I published my own books with Saffire and Skinners," said Mat Broome," so it'll be a blast coming back to the con after publishing several games with a large company like Sony, and returning to comics with 3D knowledge, and a software developers experience. It's going to allow me to do creative things with my ideas, and new properties that I could have only dreamed of before and make them more accessible to a larger audience."

Broome leads a dual career, working as an Art Director at Sony Online Entertainment and as Visual Director for the DC Universe Online MMORPG while also illustrating such comic projects as The End League for Dark Horse and Marvel Comics' Legend of the Blue Marvel. Broome has a long history in the comics industry, having got his start working on Marvel's X-Force series before joining Jim Lee's Homage Studios and WildStorm Entertainment working on a variety of projects including his own series Defcon 4. With over twenty years spent in both the comic and video game industries, Broome has first-hand knowledge and front-line experience on the ins and outs of being successful.

"Over the past 25 years in entertainment, I've met and worked with an amazing group of creators, In Music, Gaming, Publishing and even Animation," Broome explained. "There's been no shortage of talented people all wanting to share and get involved in building relationships with other professionals. Launching my own start up gives me the opportunity to "give back" to as many as possible and help grow the business to others who aren't in and around Los Angeles."

Mat Broome will be on-hand during San Diego Comic-Con at Booth #2002, showcasing both projects for both fans and industry colleagues.

Tuesday, July 6, 2010

Mile High Comics to Offer Rare Golden Age Comic Books

Press release from Mile High Comics:

Mile High Comics, Inc. President, Chuck Rozanski, announced today that he will be offering one million dollars in rare Golden Age comics from his private collection for sale at this year's San Diego Comic-Con International, to be held in San Diego, California, July 21st - 25th, 2010. His statement is as follows:


"In 1977 I was blessed to discover the Mile High/Edgar Church collection of 18,000 extremely high grade "Golden Age" comics, all of which were published between 1935-1953. This collection has become legendary in the comics world (as well as within the entire spectrum of all collectibles) as being one of the most valuable antique finds of all time, with a current estimated market value exceeding one hundred million dollars. While most of the comics from that one collection were sold by me decades ago when their market prices were but a tiny fraction of today's values, I steadfastly held on to 40+ key issues for the past 34 years in my own private comics collection, including the highest-graded copy remaining in the world of the 1940 RED RAVEN #1, one of the rarest Timely/Marvel first issues ever published, and the entire twenty-two issue run of the THE SPIRIT, released by comics legend Will Eisner between 1944 and 1948.

After having experienced two life-threatening episodes of West Nile Fever-induced encephalitis of the hypothalamus (a severe swelling of the brain) during the past seven years, however, I have been made acutely aware that estate planning now needs to be a priority for me. That realization led me to the painful decision earlier this year that I should finally agree to pass on these incredibly rare and wonderful comics that have brought me so much joy for the majority of my adult life, to another passionate comics collector. To launch the sales process, I will be bringing all of my remaining comics from the Mile High/Edgar Church collection to this year's incredible San Diego Comic-Con International, the largest and most prestigious comics convention in the world, with over 125,000 avid comics fans attending. The combined price that I will be asking for my last remaining Mile High/Edgar Church comics will be in excess of one million dollars. That amount is significantly ab! ove their current Overstreet Comic Book Price Guide estimates, but in a world where lesser condition copies of ACTION #1 (the first Superman appearance) and DETECTIVE #27 (the first Batman comic) have recently sold at auction for over one million dollars each, it does not seem unreasonable for me to be asking a similar price for the last remaining unsold key issues from the most renowned comics collection of all time. If my beloved comics do not sell in San Diego, then they will most probably be sold at auction, later this fall.

Whether these fantastic comics from my private collection end up selling in San Diego, or not, the very fact that I will be bringing these incredibly rare comics for public viewing at the convention will provide tens of thousands of individual comics collectors with what will probably turn out to be their only opportunity to personally see some of the rarest comics still extant in the world. After having had these great comics locked in a bank vault for well over three decades, I am now very much looking forward to sharing them with all of my many thousands of friends in the comics world. No matter what else happens, I believe that my actions will help to make this year's San Diego Comic-Con remain noteworthy in the minds of dedicated comics fans for many years to come."


Mile High Comics, Inc. is a Denver, Colorado based retailer of collector comic books, graphic novels, and trade paperbacks. With four Denver-area retail comics stores, four huge warehouses filled with over eight million back issue comics, and a website that provides service to well over 100,000 comics fans worldwide, Mile High Comics is one of the largest comics retailers in the world. For further information please contact Chuck Rozanski, or Lynne MacAfee, weekdays at 303-455-2659, or write to Lynne@milehighcomics.com

http://www.milehighcomics.com/

IMPACT City Now at App Store

The true digital manga IMPACT City is now available on the App Store.

After the exclusive presentation at Japan Expo 2010 of the first true digital manga IMPACT City, you can now follow the adventures of Kaelan on your iPhone and iPod Touch.

Download IMPACT City, manga as you’ve never read before, now on the App Store: http://itunes.apple.com/app/impact-city/id379018522?mt=8

Find out more about IMPACT City on the official website : www.impact-city.com.

Champion City Comics Announces New Webcomics

Press release from Champion City Comics:

Champion City Comics (http://www.championcitycomics.com/) has one new web-comic and two updated web-comics for your viewing pleasure.


WHAT'S NEW?

JOHNNY KNUCKLES by Joseph Haemmerle - Johnny Knuckles is a space trucker who is a freewheeling kind of guy leading the convoy on an intergalactic highway. Life ain't easy for Johnny Knuckles but he'll get your cargo there on time, unless he meets up with a pretty little alien darling.

WHAT'S BEEN UPDATED?

THE END OF PARADISE by TonyDoug Wright and A. Kaviraj - Nick Hamilton, a former small-time criminal, is on a serious revenge mission to kill Frankie Paradise, a notorious mob boss responsible for the death of an innocent man and his family. Joining Nick on his mission is Marshall Jackson, a weapons dealer, and The Kid, a teenage prophet and gun for hire. Nick, Marshall, and The Kid must take out Paradise's henchmen in order to get to their main target, Frankie Paradise.

THE CHAMPION CITY FIRE by TonyDoug Wright and Joseph Haemmerle - New Ravenwood, Ohio, also known as The Champion City, is full of crooked cops, pushy dames, untouchable crime lords, and gun-wielding vigilantes that can travel time. Two clean cops, Johnny Magnum and Andrea Hammer, are on a mission to put an end to the crime and corruption in The Champion City by enlisting the help of a retired cop and a patient from an insane asylum.

ANYTHING ELSE?

WESTWOOD by TonyDoug Wright and Victor Pozzi - On April 1, 1993, Charlie Westwood, stole two mystical black orbs from the headquarters of a secret society and vanished. Three men responsible for recovering the orbs, Bill, Mickey, and Bobby, spent over a decade following leads concerning Westwood’s disappearance until an archivist discovered a shocking photograph of Westwood and the orbs dated sixteen years before his disappearance.

Stop by http://www.championcitycomics.com/ and check out our web-comics! Eight hundred Champion City Comics readers can't be wrong! [END]

Devil's Due No Longer with Diamond Distributors

Press release (from a publisher in trouble):

DEVIL'S DUE PULLS DISTRIBUTION FROM DIAMOND

Re-aligns Book Store Distribution, Opens Direct Line to Retailers, Focuses on Digital Business

Devil's Due Publishing has pulled its distribution of comics and graphic novels from Diamond Comic and Diamond Book Distributors, effective today. The Publisher will soon be announcing its new book store distribution partners, and will offer product direct to comic book retail outlets, as well as distribution through Haven Comic Distributors.

"For almost over a year Devil's Due has been in an unwinnable situation wherein Diamond garnishes our revenues to pay back returns and fees it claims are owed from 2008 and 2009, making it impossible for us to keep up with payments to talent, printers, and other expenses while maintaining a stable business," said Josh Blaylock, president of Devil's Due, who was forced to wind down the company's publishing rather than ramp up as it originally planned to do when hit with a rough economy in 2008. "We've exhausted every resource to get on track, with a primary focus on catching up with talent payments first and formost, but when Diamond controls the money flow, that becomes impossible."

The decision did not come lightly, adds Blaylock, "Of course this is the last thing a company wants to do in the Diamond dominated comic book industry, but it is necessary if we are going to be able to ever again be able to turn the money faucet back on. I am hopeful that we will be able to work something out with Diamond in the future. Until we verify a number of questions regarding sales from late 2008 through the present, DDP will be utilizing other avenues of distribution to move back stock, as well as limited releases of select new material.

To order direct, DDP encourages customers to contact the numbers and emails below.

Haven Distributors
1-877-HAVEN-50(1-877-428-3650)
http://www.havendistro.com/

Devil's Due Direct Sales: j.blay@devilsdue.net

Book Store Distribution : Coming Soon

It also welcomes fans to purchase digital downloads on Graphic.ly, iVerse through the iTunes App store, and comiXology, the latter of which currently has over 100 comics available at https://comics.comixology.com/#/devils_due including the never-released-in-print Hack/Slash - Mercy Sparx: A Slice of Hell crossover special: https://comics.comixology.com/#/series/4592, as the sales from these companies are going in large part towards paying off moneys owed to licensors and talent.


About Devil's Due
Proliferators of comic culture, Devil's Due carries a diverse line-up of original, creator-owned and licensed properties. Whether in Los Angeles or its homebase of Chicago, DDP is known for partnerships with and projects in development for film and television with 20th Century Fox, ABC Family, Relativity Media, New Line Cinema, Starz Media, Rogue Pictures, DiBonaventura Productions and more.

Devil's Due started in 2000 when founder Josh Blaylock left the apparel licensing industry to form a boutique creative solutions company with a publishing arm. That was until the comic book operation exploded. Devil's Due continues to be a pioneer in the industry with expansion into digital comics for the iPhone and mobile devices, collaborations with major motion picture producers and music artists.