Sunday, December 24, 2017

Recent Readings, Ancient Thoughts


I read numerous books for research purposes, and I do have a project ongoing that I need to make myself more familiar with.  Well, either that or I just love reading books about the ancient history of the peoples of the Mediterranean Sea.


Generally speaking some of the books I read succeed in terms of facts and scholarly, academic information, but do not entertain.  Some of them are highly entertaining, but have only a little academic worth.  The best make you love learning the event, culture, people while entertainingly telling the story in question.


Donald Kagan, Peter S. Wells, Adrian Goldsworthy, Victor Davis Hanson are so good at what they do. The prose is constructed in ways that the reader is engaged, and the information is transferred well.


I have read a number of reviews of these works, and the reviewers come in two categories, high mind snooty academician, and someone who was confused and thinks these books are novels.  And then there are the people who don't like history but want to review it to shit upon it?  I get not liking something, I don't share that desire to poop on something because of it, but I absolutely understand that not every area of existence appeals to people.  Poetry, which I love doesn't appeal to even most people.  Unless you think Lyrics in music is a form of poetry, which I don't.

But Archilochus is amazing.

"Heart, my heart, so battered with misfortune far beyond your strength,
up, and face the men who hate us. Bare your chest to the assault
of the enemy, and fight them off. Stand fast among the beamlike spears.
Give no ground; and if you beat them, do not brag in open show,
nor, if they beat you, run home and lie down on your bed and cry.
Keep some measure in the joy you take in luck, and the degree you
give way to sorrow. All our life is up-and-down like this."  Archilochus


I get asked why History?  Why not science or philosophy, religious studies or any other discipline.  I have no choice in what moves me.  But I'd definitely suggest that part of why history appeals to me is the possibility to answer questions that I feel are important.  Without aiming at any group or viewpoint, I think most of history is accurate, but the people using history to support their wrong viewpoint should be punished.  When the supposed race of Aryans were said to be the original supermen, they'd been created by the group inserting them into history, and that is bad.  But when people say Cleopatra was black, when she was so clearly of Macedonian and Greek heritage, when people argue that the native Americans were indigenous to the Americas from the beginning, it makes me want to vomit.  Similarly, there are idiots on Youtube who give Top 10 list or something, using jet fighters footage in WWI, or tanks in the Civil War, these people should go snort Ajax, and scrub their brains with Comet.  They are utterly stupid.  Which isn't to say Black History cannot be proud of many things.  Nor, would an essay or documentary about war in the general sense need to have specific pics.  I think the idea that controlling the past allows empowerment in the present is somewhat valid, but not authentically so.  I have always said if you need to lie about a subject to make it work, it doesn't, actually, work.

"Let who will boast their courage in the field,
I find but little safety from my shield.
Nature's, not honour's, law we must obey:
This made me cast my useless shield away,
And by a prudent flight and cunning save
A life, which valour could not, from the grave.
A better buckler I can soon regain;
But who can get another life again?"   Archilochus

Friday, October 13, 2017

We could use more, and maybe in tpb format too

Either collect em in TPB, bring out more issues, or do both.  Once again, click on various images to see in larger size.



I remember wanting a lot more of this.  The concept, as it appears, is rather huge, but, when you make it work, huge is an asset.   A mental institution houses a fellow who has to deal with his own demons, the evil predators called doctors, and, illusions.  His town is going to be consumed by insanity.  But, will he survive to save them?  Mark Teague and Derek McCaw didn't get the press they should have, because, this book was sweet.


Whisper, by Steven Grant and quite a number of artists, was a tale of a woman who was also a ninja.  It was well written, not always great but always at least good, and, you could see some young artists, like Norm Breyfogle begin their career.  I liked it, and always thought that comic readers missed out by not getting a large collected tpb of this, and that it isn't still ongoing is rather brutally insane.  Steven Grant is a great writer, one who does work I quite enjoy.



Matt Feazell is a cartoonist with a concept here, a boy raised by ants has super powers, well to the ants this human is a super hero.  And it is funny beyond the concept, he has enemies such as lawnmowers and expectations of others that he is merely human.  I'd love to have more editions of this, as well as a collection.  Hell, I used to buy extra sets to share, so that I could evangelize the world.  Most people liked it.  Those who didn't like it apparently were quite stupid.



This work by Jim Krueger, Matt Smith, Jason Baroody and Brett Weldele featured a society of men, perhaps eternal, who lived in a massive mountain, filled with clockwork.  They were the engine of eternity, they caused and canceled revolutions and wars.  And the series never was finished.  It needs to be done.  Jim promised me a copy, and I gave him a copy of my first book, so, hey, I am due.  Also, despite some format issues, I LOVE the concept.  Others loved the format but couldn't see the depth of the concept.  Oh well.  It needs to be completed.


STRIKE was a comic by two talented fellows, Tom Lyle on art, Chuck Dixon on words.   Of the many reasons I liked this work, the most compelling for me was the back story created to place it in a context of where the power harness came from, and how the world knows about the hero named STRIKE.  It was quite new for its time and I'd love to see it collected in TPB.  Dammit.

Wednesday, October 11, 2017

More Truman Gold to Uncover

Any reasonable human having read my writing online over the last 15 years (and holy shit to 15 years) knows I have favorite creative talents.  I make no secret of it.  And Timothy Truman is among my very favorite people.  His work speaks to me in his writing talent and art skills, and vice versa.

And beyond talent and skills, dedication to craft, I think T2 is a wonderful human being in a world really not nearly so wonderful others.

This article is specifically to address 4 series of comics that ought to be collected in TPB format.  I have no idea who owns what.  I have no idea if any of these are at all possible.  I liked them.

Click any image to see at full size.

CREATURE COMMANDOS
Written by Truman
With Art by Scot Eaton

I appreciate this series for many reasons.  I like the art, and the story, and what I like about it too is the depth of characters.  I felt like I wanted the team to return home whole.  And just where the mission leads will amaze you.  This is a fantastic fun piece of action.






THE BLACK LAMB
By Truman

This concept is darker than the previous book, the Tribes of the Night have a society and within that is a lawkeeper.  He is a centuries old vampire who is nonetheless a protector of his flock.  Despite some issue with the clarity of various panels on the page, this was a great comic.


GUNS OF THE DRAGON
By Truman

Three DC characters are on an adventure together, in a dangerous place, with dinosaurs, ninja, Chinese junks, guns, swords and more.  It is a fun adventure, one with the same deft use of character, dialogue and action as other Truman works.  Fun stuff. 


THE SPIDER: MASTER OF MEN series 1 & 2
By Truman and Quique Alcatena


The Spider was a character found in pulp novels who was very much different than anything out there in certain respects.   He used heavy disguise and clothing to alter his appearance, but tried to take on aspects of vampirism and the horror figures of the day to make himself a creature of the night, not simple a vigilante with a gun.  He had connections to different cultures, different sorts of philosophies, and was not a killer of police or people on the good side of the law.  Truman's take on this character is reflective of his own sensitivities and of all the works out there I think this could be a beefy addition to the Truman aisle in the best of TPBs room.




Friday, October 6, 2017

Lords of Order, Lords of Chaos



There is a philosophy called Dualism which holds that there are only two kinds of people in this world: those who divide everything into two categories and those who don’t.
All right; so maybe that’s not exactly what Dualism teaches, but people have been perceiving the world as paired opposites ever since Marduk cleaved the body of Tiamat with his sword and fashioned the world from the two halves. The theme was old when Zoroaster first envisioned the universe as a cosmic struggle between Truth and Falsehood. And so we have Light and Darkness; Yin and Yang; Anima and Animus; Marvel and DC.
Order and Chaos.
I probably first encountered the theme of Order vs. Chaos through Dungeons and Dragons, where it forms one of the axes of it's system of Character Alignment. D&D lifted the idea from two influential fantasy writers. Poul Anderson used this theme in his fantasy novels, Three Hearts and Three Lions and Operation Chaos; as well as his Dominic Flandry series, about an agent of a declining Galactic Empire, working to prevent that Empire’s eventual fall.
Writing about the same time as Anderson, and to a certain extent borrowing from him, British SF writer Michael Moorcock wove Order and Chaos into to his stories about Elric of Melniboné. His tragic hero, Elric, finds himself caught in the struggle between the Gods of Chaos whom his family has served for centuries, and the Gods of Order. Roy Thomas brought Elric to comics in the early '70s, having him appear in a two-part story in Marvel's CONAN THE BARBARIAN. Since then there have been various comics adaptations of Elric published by different companies and drawn by artists such as Barry Windsor-Smith, Walt Simonson and P. Craig Russell.
Inspired by Elric, Jim Starlin created a pair of cosmic buttinskis called Master Order and Lord Chaos, who each manifested himself as a giant disembodied head. Although, they personified opposing principles, they were described as brothers and usually worked together. They understood the need for Balance between their two forces in the Universe, and to that end combined their powers to create an entity called the In-Betweener to embody Balance.
In the 1980s, the gods of Elirc worked their way into DC Comics, with a number of their mystic heroes recast as soldiers or pawns in this struggle. Dr. Fate was originally an archaeologist who gained magical powers by donning the "Helm of Nabu", an artifact created by an ancient Egyptian sorcerer. Nabu was rewritten as one of the Lords of Order and Dr. Fate became their sometimes rebellious servant in their eternal war against the Lords of Chaos. Other characters, such as the Phantom Stranger and Kid Eternity, also got redefined along the Order vs. Chaos axis.
At the time, the notion that Order and Good are not always congruent seemed reasonably profound to me. After all, the Nazis were all about Order, and they certainly were Evil. This theme came up again in the TV series  Babylon 5  in the conflict between the seraphic Vorlons and the malevolent Shadows, aliens which at first seemed to personify Good vs. Evil but later on were seen to embody an arbitrary moral Order vs. a Darwinian Chaos.
Now, I grew up in the wake of the ‘60s, which equated Order with Repression and Chaos with Freedom. There was nothing new about this; G.K. Chesterton, writing at the beginning of the century, began his surreal novel  The Man Who Was Thursday  with a debate between a poet claiming that all art is anarchy and another claiming to be a "poet of Order".
Chesterton’s near contemporary Rudyard Kipling wrote a famous line in his poem "Recessional" about "lesser breeds without the law." Despite the temptation to associate Kipling’s "lesser breeds" with the brown-skinned natives his empire subjugated, in the context of the poem he’s referring to peoples who worship power for its own sake, untempered by a respect for justice and honor. The militaristic Prussians of Kipling’s time and the Nazis who eventually followed them may have been rigid in terms of rules and regimentation, but lawless in their ethical codes.
Later on, I decided the idea of Law and Chaos not equaling Good and Evil wasn’t quite as deep as my comic books thought it was. If your only choices are Order and Chaos, any hero worth his spandex will have to side with Order, because heroes are all about helping people and saving them from destruction. Chaos  causes  destruction and doesn’t care about anybody. Poul Anderson knew this, which is why in his stories Chaos is always a force to be combated. He was an engineer at heart, I think, and associated Chaos with entropy and decay, and associated Order with preservation and building. And he knew his Kipling.
Alan Moore understood this too. In his revolutionary series, V for Vendetta, his hero, V, is certainly an anarchist, an agent of Chaos bringing down a corrupt Order. But once the repressive government has been overthrown, a new and better one must now be built. That is something V is incapable of doing. The anarchist must step back so that a new and hopefully better Order can be created. But anarchy remains waiting in the wings, just to keep Order honest.
Not everybody gets that point. About the time DC reprinted the original V FOR VENDETTA series, they introduced a character in BATMAN named “Anarky” inspired by V and intended to be a sort of libertarian hero out to smash Big Order. To me the character seemed simplistic and he never appealed to me.
Neil Gaiman gently mocked the eternal conflict between Order and Chaos in his graphic novel  Books of Magic. When Dr. Fate explains the struggle between the two forces, young Tim Hunter comments that it sounds like a series of rotten fantasy novels.
"Oh no," Fate replies; "It is the basis of Magic: the imposition of Order on formless Chaos, the release of Joyous Chaos into the Gray monotony of Order..."
To which Tim’s companion John Constantine mutters, "Chaos versus Order indeed. I thought Everyone had heard of Fractals these days. There’s no chaos, no order; just patterns of different levels of complexity."
Perhaps; but dualistic lenses like that of Law vs. Chaos are how we try to make sense of these patterns.

At least that’s what a person of Lawful Alignment would say.

Friday, September 29, 2017

Comics that a kid in Wisconsin bought with paper route money and

... birthday money, and a wee bit of an allowance.


I am trying to do the occasional article here about comics that are current, interviews, reviews if such work comes my way, and some PR.  I love comics.  So this will be a recurring theme now and then, because comics that are new alone, are not the whole picture.  They are comfort food, they inspired me to be moral as much as my fallen flawed psyche can be, and led me to becoming a creative artist, however successful or not.  I think about them in terms of being art.  I think about them as things to make children smile.  And I think of all the amazingly talented comic industry professionalsI have met due to comics, and additionally, some truly awesome people who have become my friends also love comics. 

If I received an allowance, I didn't spend it all.  I saved most of anything I had.  But, I'd eventually fork over a quarter for a comic, and OMG, I was spellbound.  I was also somewhat specific in my taste, comics with cartoon characters didn't move me.  Funny animals weren't my thing.  I liked the genres of war, giant monsters and superheroes. I still do.  I'd add horror, and stuff that defies any convenient label.  And while my tastes have matured and evolved, the reasons I like those genres are not the same. 


My brother was a guy who read a shit ton of books, all the time, and from an early age.  We didn't altogether share taste in comics, but we both loved comics.  Escapism is one reason to read comics, and beyond simple escapism, appreciating great story telling, being moved by the art or characters, made comics different from kids books, they were ageless, at least if they were well done.  Escapism is one thing.  A creation of art is another thing.  But maybe another reason I read them, is that it gave me, a kid who stood out in crowd being chubby faced, tall, and naive, an agency to respond to bullies.  No, I didn't whip out my cape and beat them bloody.  No I didn't turn invisible and make them look to be fools.  I read in the comics stories about good defeating evil, people faced with impossible odds, and still achieving victory.  I was able, through comics to see and imagine the defeat of enemies, and bullies are assholes needing an ass whipping.



I was far more familiar with DC characters like Batman and Superman than the Marvel comics characters.  I can't say, however, that it was due to enjoyment of the comics.  For the most part Marvel stories didn't get told in a single issue, while DC mostly did.  As a kid in a town with very spotty comic book sources, I didn't want to be left hanging and never know what happened.  As an adult I've even bought comics that had been continued next issue, and left me stranded.  Some of the comics weren't good at all in retrospect, but damn it felt good to get an answer.




Wednesday, September 20, 2017

A brief look at my life in comics

I was asked how I got into the comic book industry, and what comic books I've written.  Most people do not realize I've done both journalistic work in the world of comics, and creative.  I've been an idiot, made mistakes, done weak interviews, meaningless reviews, and, I've grown and done great interviews and the same sort of reviews.  As a person who gets violently ill reading the words of asshole comic book reviewers and even worse interviews, my goal was always to be a person to encourage readers to seek out this work, or read or enjoy this creative person's work.  The never satisfied, always angry, never allowing one's self to enjoy something journalists miss the point.  It is as if you go to a comic book store on Free Comic day, which should be a celebration, and every staff member there are unhappy, unhelpful, and make the day something closer to unpleasant.


Comics are fun.  They can be serious or not.  They can be good in the serious, they can be bad, the same goes for the comics that are simply meant to be fun or silly.  To me the world of comics is diminished when to be accepted it has to be high art, or ignored as low brow entertainment.   The comic book industry is large enough to be everything.  As a kid I loved all sorts of comics.  There is no reasonable standard for judgment of comics if you have to like the serious and hate the less serious. Talent and time is poured out on both, regardless of your preference.

As a writer, interviewer, reviewer, sometimes  I worked at numerous sites, starting at the retailer's page at Robin Goodfellow, then to Slush Factory and UGO, then in different stints at Popthought my own site, CBR, Comicon the Pulse, The Great Curve Blog, and many more... and now simply at Poplitiko.blogspot.com 

I worked hard, often over 60 hours a week doing interviews and reviews, as well as commentary.  I received review product from a couple dozen companies.  And I tried to feature comics from the whole of the industry.  As such I made contacts across the industry.  Some people in the industry thought I loved everything, which is simply not true, I focused on the good.  Some people in the industry thought I was an asshole, because I didn't want to review their book.  Some hated me for not running their PR but running that of others.  But some people appreciated what I did.  Some spent more time than normal with me, some gave me more than time, I eventually worked with them.

And how I started is a tale I've told elsewhere, but, due to my being a person who tried to support the less powerful publishers as well as the mainstream, I received invitations to pitch ideas at a number of them.  In two cases my pitches were accepted, but the publisher died before them coming to print.  In one case the publisher screwed my partner so I said fuck that.  At one publisher our book was accepted but after a year of waiting we said nuts and released it ourselves.  But, from the first true offer, Viper's invite to have me do a story in Josh Howard Presents Sasquatch, to the small publisher owned by Bob Giadrosich that released my first work A Life of Ravens, I learned a great deal about the world of comics, and publishing.  (A Life of Ravens had many different forms of expression, comics, short prose, poetry, epic poetry, and essay).  The people who assisted me in this creative life span a great many genres, formats and industries, but those who assisted me with advice, interviews, reviews, and creative work, I show to the right.  No amount of thanks from me would be enough.  I am in their debt.


There are more people I've worked with, and they are not from the world of comics, so I have not included them, but I wanted to say, this collection of people is for comics only, and by no means is it complete.  I have done comic work in the below shown works. I still have copies of 3 of them.  If you are interested in them I can be found at  

My Email Address 
Alexanderness63 @gmail.com

Or at my Twitter home 
https://twitter.com/alexnesspoetry

My poetry blog
http://alexnesspoetry.blogspot.com
http://alexnesspoetry.blogspot.com/2007/01/My-Work.html

Or at my Amazon page
https://www.amazon.com/author/alexness


“In the depths of winter, I finally learned that within
me there lay an invincible summer.”  Albert Camus 



Friday, September 15, 2017

Just in time for Halloween TPBs that ought to be

THE DEMON
Alan Grant writer
Val Semeiks art

Despite the quality of both writing and art, Demon gets no love.  Despite the story telling that is modern in aesthetics and humorous, it gets no love from the publisher.  DC Comics was about to create the Vertigo imprint, and Demon would have fit in, but, for whatever reasons, it never became a work for that imprint.  The early run of Demon has been ignored, but there were two late series collections, written by the more sexy name, Garth Ennis.  And however good that was, the work that preceded it was better.   It ought to be captured in tpb.  It is criminal that it is not.


THE SPECTRE
Doug Moench writer

Gene Colan   art

The Tom Mandrake John Ostrander run of Spectre was beyond good, and it has been collected little by little.  This version was not at all bad, and I enjoyed it.  It was not the same work as the previously mentioned version.  But, whatever the differences, this version was both well written, thought provoking, and lovely to look at.  I say this despite my not being a great fan of Gene Colan's art, but this comic required a dark moody presentation, and Colan did succeed in doing that.  The tone of this version of The Spectre was somewhere between the cosmic and the superhero.  The stories were interesting, if not nearly as deep as the Ostrander/Mandrake version.  I say all this and recommend that it be collected, because there are plenty of crap books out there, why not reprint the many good ones?


HELLSTORM
Rafael Nieves, Len Kaminski writing
Michael Bair, Peter Gross art

I am sorry to include this one.  Not because it doesn't deserve collecting, I think it does, but because I believe that it could have been so much better.  The Son of Satan was given a regular series and the comic shows how he is divided between his desire to be fearsome, and powerful, but somehow become more than his lineage/father.  He isn't a hero, but isn't quite a villain.  This work is often times exciting but it does not reach the depths of darkness possible, due, partly I think, to the limits of the audience and limits of expression.  Still, it is interesting, well drawn with writing that was good despite the desires to keep the stories within a certain boundary of taste or expression.

The advent of the TPB helped many readers sit in one take a comic released, originally, serially.  It allowed a less disjointed experience... and thereby some comics with subtle building of plot lines and story ideas could become better by the experience of a single read of the entire run in question.  This book would read much better in tpb form, and eventually readers were entertained by Warren Ellis's take on the character.  But, Marvel needed a Vertigo section of the publisher so the power of expression could be unleashed.  I enjoyed it, but always wanted more. 

Friday, September 1, 2017

TPBs that need to be: Roy Thomas Edition

Roy Thomas was very young at the same time as very successful in the world of comics.  For a very brief second or two spent at DC, before going to Marvel full time, he was an under 25 years old comic book fan with an enormous love for the medium, and a vast knowledge of the characters of both major publishers.

Thomas quickly became Editor in Chief to Stan Lee's role as Publisher, and there was a certain dynamism between the two.  Thomas was considered the main writer for the character Conan, and used his knowledge of the history of the characters of Marvel to establish teams of the past, such as the Invaders, Liberty Legion and more.  His work was that of a fan favorite, and he was prolific.

Thomas stepped down from the EiC position and was eventually replaced by Jim Shooter, who seemed very much a pharaoh who sought to erase all memory of the previous pharaoh.  Roy Thomas eventually found the cold relationship too much to remain at Marvel, and he began a run at DC Comics that saw him taking over the golden age characters he had long desired to write.  If he was somewhat seen as being too concerned about the iron tight continuity he believed necessary, he was also counted upon to do just that.  DC united the various alternate earths and comic worlds and Roy Thomas kept busy rewriting the new history of DC, and he tried to keep the golden age characters relevant.

The following offerings suggest only that these should be done, but with such a prolific and well considered writer, much of his work is already in TPB form.  As such, it is possible that these are not his best series, because they've been done, but these works do deserve to be collected.


CONAN THE ADVENTURER came about as an attempt to reboot and reintroduce the character to an audience who had not begun reading the long running original series.  Rafael Kayanan OBVIOUSLY loved the subject, his highly detailed stylistically pleasing work was a fine accompaniment to Thomas's comfortable and fun writing style.


ANTHEM's themes and setting harkens back to the ideas of The Invaders and The Justice Society, but is different in one very important way.  This world's heroes are not fighting alongside the soldiers of the Allies, they are trying to recover and renew a defeated and invaded America.  It is an alternate version of history with superheros and fantasy elements, and it captures, shows or tries to show the heroic ideal fighting for the life of the country.  I include this because I love the idea.  And the writing is good, for what is there.  But the art?  I really wish the series could be reconsidered with new art because it was very different issue to issue, and however various panels were, it was not a congealed work.  So, while I'd like a tpb of this, I'd like a new edition with better art.  Yeah yeah, I can hear you all out there saying gee, it is easy spending other people's money and time.  Big deal.  I deserve it.


CAPTAIN THUNDER AND BLUE BOLT are a father son team, that is both different than any other comic duo, and reminiscent of the best of comic hero teams.  But this had generational angst, settings of real life, and actually, quite nice art and story telling.  A B level work, nothing perfect but it is completely entertaining and smart.  (Another work that has been reprinted in TPB form Alter Ego was an equally clever use of the format and reality, to the point that the writer Roy Thomas did comic style dialogue for certain situations while the non heroic comic moments used what could be described as a more mature real sounding, perhaps adult voice speaking.  Captain Thunder is less mature than Alter Ego, but both are good).


THE SAGA OF THE SUB-MARINER runs from the very beginning of Marvel's history, and ends at the present.  Prince Namor the Sub-mariner was an anti hero most of the time, and various writers have attempted their own interpretation of why he was so naughty on occasions.  But few approach this level of awesome.  Thomas is a comic historian, and this book evokes every era of the character and reminds us why we love Namor.  The Rich Buckler art was among the best of his career, and this series was a complete and absolute joy.


ARAK: Son of Thunder was a cross cultural character who was not created with stereotypes in mind.  I liked it a lot for what it was, even if it wasn't perfect, the writing was good, and the art was great.  I think this series needed to be as violent as the story demanded.  So, I think it could have been a lot better, and I am not complaining, it was the era still of comics being seen as for general audiences. 


THE SAGA OF THE ORIGINAL HUMAN TORCH  This series is very much like the aforementioned Saga of the Sub-mariner, but with a less wide focus.  It remains, however a fine work, with excellent art.  I really think it should be paired with the Sub-mariner book in a larger tpb, but two series tpbs is fine too.  The Original Human Torch was awesome, intelligently done from the beginning, and is a very heroic figure, however much his recent use is cliché.  

Monday, August 28, 2017

A Flight of Heroes HAWKWORLD Interview and a new TPB

HAWKWORLD was a vibrant reboot of the character of Hawkman, with a new take on an old character, to make his present story more powerful and relevant to the audience of the 1980s.  It was similar in aim to Man of Steel by John Byrne, Frank Miller's Dark Knight Returns, George Perez's Wonder Woman, Mike Grell's Green Arrow Long Bow Hunters, here was a new and yet familiar character to meet, again.  Timothy Truman's 3 issue series was every bit as good as the others mentioned above, and it was followed by an ongoing monthly series written by John Ostrander, art by Graham Nolan, and watched over with an cowriter/editorial view, by Timothy Truman.

This is an interview with Truman and Nolan, and by the end of the piece there is a notice about a hopefully upcoming TPB in 2018.






ME: I loved Hawkworld. Did you have the project in mind and pitched it, or did DC say, hey, umm, we really like your stuff, would you consider doing...?

Timothy Truman: Thanks, Alex. I'm really proud of the work that (inker) Quique Alcatena and I did on the miniseries.

Mike Gold,  the editor, contacted me, as I recall. I can't remember whether or not it was to work on a Hawkman reboot, specifically, or if he just asked me whether or not I'd consider doing a Prestige series for DC.  I had been doing creator owned projects at the time, working exclusively with the independent publishers-- First, Eclipse, Pacific, a few things for Dark Horse. I was a bit of a snob in that regard. I wanted to support the indies and all the advances they'd made in regards to creator's rights. I also liked the artistic freedom that working with the independents allowed me. So I was originally reluctant to accept the offer.

The things that finally swung me were the facts that, to keep in pace wit the things that the indie publishers were offering artists and writers, mainstream publishers like DC and Marvel had adopted more creator-friendly publishing policies. Also, in the mid-1980's, I'd befriended classic Hawkman writer Gardner F. Fox. Before Gar died, we'd actually talked about pitching DC a new Hawkman series. Gar wanted to do a very Edgar Rice Burroughs/John Carter of Mars take on the character-- something very fantasy or space opera oriented. Unfortunately, I'd been too busy at the time to pursue such a project. When I finally found time to consider the project, Gar passed away. (In fact, he died the very night that I was composing a letter to him, asking him if he'd still be interested in doing something together.)

So when Mike approached me, Gar's original proposal to me once again popped into my mind.  He hadn't given me any details about plot specifics or anything but it seemed like a cool way to pay tribute to him. So I told Mike that I'd be willing to give it a try. I worked up a pitch and he he and the folks at DC really liked it. I must say that getting the European Haxtur Award for "Best Miniseries" the year it appeared was one of the proudest moments of my life.

ME: I have heard criticisms of the piece that making Hawkman thereafter a crusader for the poor seemed like a cliché.  Is that a point you worried about afterward?

TT: Ha! No, not in the least. Actually, I hadn't heard that one.  I don't really keep up with fan chatter like that. Seems rather strange, though. I thought that's one of the things that superheroes were supposed to do. Part of their original mission statement, you know? Go figure.

ME: To me, having someone overcome addiction and rise above a world view that was toxic meant the person was himself morally poor but chose to evolve and change that.


TT: Thanks. Those are pretty much the key components of the story for the Prestige miniseries -- to create this personal arc for Katar. He begins as an idealist-- a historian who worships the old legends of the ancient Thanagarian hero, Kalmoran.  He becomes a cop to do good, but starts seeing the ugly truth about the society that he's protecting. He learns that things like the Kalmoran stories are just handy myths used to justify those ugly truths. Gets depressed, takes drugs to cope, goes through a downfall that takes him straight to the bottom of life. How he climbs back up through that is how he becomes a hero. It's part of his journey, his personal evolution. At the time, I had pretty much given up reading fiction and had dived face-first into hard core studies of early American history. I was into the deep stuff-- rare first-hand accounts & primary source material that were really shattering a lot of the things that I'd been told since I was a kid. So Hawkworld drew on a lot of that. Of course a few years later I got to put these investigations to use in a more direct manner with my graphic novel Wilderness: the True Story of Simon Girty.

ME: Your work Hawkworld both redefined and refined the character from the Silver age.  It was adopted and the series Hawkworld, (crazy coincidence?) came out. As a result of the monthly series, some people became confused about the timeline and worried over continuity. When you were creating the 3-issue Prestige series, did that come up from DC, or were you just doing your creative thang and all of the editorial machinations happened afterward?

TT: Originally, I was only concerned with the 3-issue series. That was my only concern. I wanted to to stand alone, like a single SF novel or something. A good, solid space opera adventure story , but with some meat on its bones. That's how I worked, even on things like my Scout series-- to take the approach that each project was actually a single novel with pictures.

However, the miniseries was extremely successful. So as you might imagine, DC wanted to take advantage of that and launch it as a regular series. They wanted me to write and draw it, but I had my sights on other projects. I'd done what I wanted to do with the character via the miniseries and I wanted to move on to other things that I was eager to get into-- mainly Wilderness.  However, they wanted me to be involved in some way.  So I suggested they get John Ostrander to do the monthly and put in the recommendation that they look into Graham Nolan as the artist, as I'd worked with him on the Prowler backup stories at Eclipse. I told them that I'd help John co-plot the series, but I actually served as more of a consultant.

I detected a problem right off the bat with the continuity, though. The story I'd told in the original 3-issue series was intended to have taken place years and years before the  then-current DC continuity. The prestige stories was an expansion and elaboration on the old original, initial Gar Fox and Joe Kubert Silver Age stories that had been set on Thanagar. I had that notion form the start. If it had been played that way, I believe things would have been fine. But it was the age of the "Year One" DC series, you know? DC wanted the new monthly series to take up where the Prestige had left off and have Katar and Shayera come to earth during the then-current continuity. I have a notoriously short attention span, so, like I say, I was eager to move on with my own projects. So I was like, "Sure, it's your property, do what you want. Have a blast." As a result (though through no fault of John Ostrander), things got  bit muddled, continuity-wise. That's what DC wanted, though. And John and his wife Kim Yale certainly did some great stories.

ME: When you were aboard the series Hawkworld as a Editorial/Guiding hand, how much actual input did you offer?

TT: Less than I should have, and certainly less than was fair to John. He'd send me the plot for each issue, we'd have ten minute conversations on the phone each month and that was about it. I was really bad about things like that in the old days. When I was done with something, I didn't like to think about it again. My ADHD had me totally, hyper-focusing on the next project, 1000%. That's the only way I things done.

ME: Would you do a Hawkworld series using the same format if offered?


TT: I'd have to think really hard about it. It might be fun, sure, and I've learned to never count anything out. However, I'm 61 now, so I'm trying to get back to the original motivations that got me into the comics industry in the first place-- mainly getting back to doing my own stuff, via projects like Scout: Marauder, which Ben and I hope to launch soon via Kickstarter and a companion "behind the scenes" page at Patreon.com. Thanks, Timothy Truman.

For updates about Timothy's work, check out his website, www.timothytruman.com or visit his Facebook page.


GRAHAM NOLAN was the artist for the regular series of Hawkworld, and it was a wonderful run of work he did.  I asked him a number of questions to give an idea of the time he was on the book.

ME: I've really been a fan of your art work.  How did you enter the
industry?

GN: I had two class assignments at the Kubert School published in DC Comics: New Talent Showcase. It so happens the editor, Sal Amendola was my instructor at the school.

What was your first work?

GN: New Talent Showcase

ME: I know you did some Airboy, some Power of the Atom, and even my beloved Doom Patrol before doing a run on Hawkworld.  Was it the first book you really got to show your stuff?

GN: No, I think The Prowler for Eclipse comics was where I got to “show my stuff”. As with Hawkworld I did full art on that series. But Hawkworld was the biggest profile book I had worked on up till then.

ME: There were complaints about Hawkworld, perhaps not loud ones, that making a hero of Katar Hol who overcame drug addiction and a toxic attitude of entitlement to now fight for the poor and unloved, that he was being an example of the White man's burden, or Noblese Oblige. Did you think anything about his motives or how it was playing to readers, or was it just work?


GN: It was a job. I didn’t have any story input.

ME: Some people became confused about the timeline of Hawkworld, as in, was this in the present, hey we thought the prestige format series it was his origin, why start over from here?   Did any of this change or affect any of your work?  If so how so?

We didn’t start over. The monthly was a continuation of the Prestige Series and it was set in the then current continuity.

ME: I didn't mean or even say that I thought it, but I absolutely heard other people say it, just sayin'...

Did your work on the series require added research, were you trying to not deviate from Tim's template?  Did you enjoy drawing these characters?

I usually do a lot of research for every project I take on. Tim had really set the groundwork in his series so what I tried to do was capture the “feel” of the prestige series without aping it. I wanted to add my natural sense for a more dynamic style of visual storytelling.

ME: How was working with John Ostrander and Tim?  Were there ever stories that weren't a meeting of the minds?

Tim and John are great and talented guys. John’s stories leaned heavily to the political left while my leanings are to the right so there were many stories that I didn’t agree with. But I wasn’t getting paid for my story input so I did my best to make John’s stories as exciting as possible regardless of what I thought of the subject matter.

Would you return to a Hawkworld series if offered?  And please give the readers here an update of your work...

DC has returned Katar Hol to his traditional Hawkman role so I don’t see that happening.

I’m currently working on BANE: CONQUEST for DC Comics with my pal, Chuck Dixon. I also have a humor strip called SUNSHINE STATE (http://www.gocomics.com/sunshine-state) that updates every Monday so subscribe to it…it’s FREE!

THE ANNOUNCEMENT


DC Comics originally announced that in 2018 a tpb of the first 8 issues of the Hawkworld ongoing series will be released.   I've noticed some changes on the AMAZON listing, so it is perhaps going through a reschedule or a quirk in the system.  (How the hell do I know?)

Here is the publisher description...

Hawkworld Book One: The Byth Saga

A new edition of the classic title that reinvented Hawkman for the 1990s.

In this classic comics series from the 1990s, writer/artist Timothy Truman reinvented Hawkman as a brutal member of a distant planet's police force.

HAWKWORLD follows wealthy Katar Hol as he questions his role in Thanagarian society, joins the police force, is betrayed and disgraced, and then finally finds his purpose as Hawkman.

Collects HAWKWORLD #1-8, HAWKWORLD ANNUAL #1.


The AMAZON pre order link now says release date 2035, for when it will come out, I sure hope that isn't a really deep pre order schedule.  But again, there has been some change in the info, so, when exactly it happens, I don't know, I do know, I'll be happy to see it happen.

Monday, August 21, 2017

TPBs that need to be: Jamie Delano Edition

COMMENTARY
By Alex Ness
August 21, 2017

(Click on images to make them larger, they are beautiful) As I've openly stated, I like Jamie Delano and Jamie Delano's writing.  I am not unbiased with this entry.  I have read all of the available comics by Jamie.  So, I think, I am not without a certain expertise regarding this.  These three series deserve to be captured in tpb form.


GHOSTDANCING

is a vision of an outsider looking at the American history of the West, and finding it rich in racism, colonial appropriation, and mythic depth.  Divine or semi divine Native Americans enter the cryptic fifth world, one that has no flaws, one that evokes heaven.  A shaman named snake steals your attention, as does the titular drug called Ghostdancing.  We can find paradise, the fifth world, it will only cost you your soul!  The Richard Case art goes along beautifully with the powerful, provocative writing.


NARCOPOLIS 

Narcopolis is a futuristic dystopia.  In this frightful new world, you are encouraged to use drugs and pleasure to take life's edge away.  Why worry, when you can medicate the truth away?  This work evokes Clockwork Orange, Brave New World and is better or equal to any of the best works from Grant Morrison, Alan Moore, or Neil Gaiman.  Delano creates new words, new sorts of paradigms, all the while entertaining the reader.

RAWBONE

When the popular template of a pirate appeared after Johnny Depp and company's Pirates of the Caribbean they were neither dangerous or scary.  They were exciting and naughty.  You can read this series and tell yourself, Delano clearly knows what the pirates were about, and it wasn't lark or teen adventure.  It was about human predators hunting prey in the oceans.  This work features a dangerous and beautiful lead role female, and while I would not suggest it is all ages, it is worthy of being read and critically considered.  The title, RAWBONE is so very apt, the story takes apart any happy go lucky myths you have, at the same time as making the reader uncomfortable, because he is wondering what the hell is going to happen next.