Last weekend I attended the Louisville Supercon; thought you might like a brief report. This was actually one of the best conventions I've experienced. My interest was piqued initially by the solid list of classic creators: Neal Adams, Jim Shooter, Mark Bagley, Bob McCloud, Keith Giffen, Mike Grell, Bob Hall, Al Milgrom, Mike DeCarlo and Jose Delbo. The 'artists alley' was busy but well organized, hardly any wait for anyone. And kudos to the creators; they were all generous with their time. I had particularly nice conversations with :
Al Milgrom, who was amused to see a drawing he did for me in 1975 that I brought along; he commented about the change in his signature...
Jim Shooter , who discussed at some length his thoughts about the current comic industry. Among them, that the industry today has largely forgotten the fundamental necessity of giving the reader a complete story in an issue; using 'decompressed storytelling' to spread it out over numerous issues. At four dollars a pop, that asks much of the reader. I told him that I considered the comics from the mid 70's to mid 80's to be an apex of comics creativity. He gave high praise and credit to the creators he worked with , among them George Perez, Frank Miller, John Romita Sr, Gil Kane and Walt Simonson...
Mike Grell (from whom I purchased a very cool drawing of Green Lantern).
The convention's 3-day schedule was loaded with panels and activites. Of course much attention was given to other pop cultural areas as well, many celebrities from tv and film were there. Gaming, both video and table /rpg was popular.
Cosplayers were everywhere, with some truly breathtaking costumes on display...
And of course there were numerous back issue dealers, and booksellers with tpb's. I picked up a few Christmas gifts , and a few goodies for myself.
Oh, and you could get your photo taken with the Iron Giant; an amazingly BIG model in which you could pose for a charity benefit. That was impressive. All told, it was a day well spent; one worth a return next year.
And now, we turn to you. What's on your mind this week?
10 comments:
Okay, so I'll throw a question out there.
Let's take a moment and look back at some of the "Events" of the 70s & 80s. The Avengers and Defenders went to war. The X-Men and Teen Titans came together. Superman and Spider-Man tussled. The Superheroes had a Secret War. What were the best? Which ones just didn't work for you? I'm mainly talking about story lines that crossed different titles or companies. I know there were great story lines that ran in a single title (remember when Spider-Man had six arms. SIX ARMS!!!) We could do those later.
So let's take a look back, unless you may be reusing a calendar. Then you would just be looking or would have had looked back...
PS: Speaking of time, Christmas falls on a Tuesday this year. Are we going to have a topic that day?
Well, I missed some of the x-overs in real time (Avengers vs Defenders, Contest of Champions) and didn't end up reading them until later. I actually liked Secret Wars and I think it holds up pretty well; I know it was originally conceived to sell toys, but overall it's a pretty good story, with some great character moments. So I guess I like it more than a lot of people do.
I also missed Crisis the first time around (I had stopped buying DCs by that time and was Marvel exclusive), but having read it (and Legends) many times since then, I'd say they're both pretty good stories and they actually had a huge impact on the DC Universe, rewriting it from the ground up. Of course, a lot of the changes didn't last, and some characters really got screwed up (Wonder Girl, Hawkman, Power Girl) but it certainly had an impact on the entire line.
Thanks for jumping in, Prowl!
Let me start by apologizing for the late start today. When I was editing this post it seems the start time reset on me and I didn't realize until this morning. Ah, fall ability. Oh, and yes, we'll have a post on the 25th; be sure to stop by after the presents are opened,,,:)
As for events, Avengers/Defenders is the benchmark in my opinion. Great teams and battles, drama, and just plain fun.
The other biggie I'd mention is DC's Crisis on Infinite Earths. Controversial even today, but a phenomenal work that truly was an Event, before 'events' became commonplace...
First, thanks for the report, Redartz. I enjoy meeting artists at cons, and it sounds like the lineup of talent you experienced was especially meaningful given our relative ages around here. Along with Neal Adams, I never know what to think of Jim Shooter. I've met both men on multiple occasions and have always come away impressed. But sometimes their online personas, and fans' evaluations of each man, give me pause. Complex, complex...
I love the Grell sketch, and your anecdote about Al Milgrom was funny.
To Prowl's question - this may be a sacrilege, but I recall being slightly underwhelmed at the Superman/Spider-Man crossover. I was not a Superman fan at all (Superboy, yes), so that was a bit of a block for me. Had it been Batman and Spidey, I'd have been all in. Plus, given the tremendous disparity in powers, I'd have longed for a Superman/Thor or Superman/Hulk book. Batman/Daredevil would have been cool, too.
Funny you should bring up Secret Wars. I just finished my first-ever read of the series a couple of weeks ago. I also read Crisis on Infinite Earths again - 4th time through that one, including off the spinners as it was published. For my 75c, Crisis was (wait for it...) infinitely better. Some friends on Twitter have said that the two really can't be compared, and I hear that. But since I did read them at the same time, I feel qualified to judge. My complaint about SW is a thin plot that could easily have been done as an 8-issue (rather than 12) series. Crisis, conversely, was jam-packed with history, action, suspense, emotion, and just sheer dread at what was transpiring in the plot. So well written by Marv Wolfman, Crisis is perhaps George Perez's magnum opus.
Within a company but across titles? I liked the multi-parter that ran between Avengers and Super-Villain Team-Up around Avengers 154-156. I also enjoyed "Greatest Hero of them all" that ended the run of Superboy with the Legion, post-Crisis. That crossed over with Action and Superman, with Legion 37 and 38 bookending the story.
Doug
I liked the X-Men and Teen Titans crossover. I would have liked to see a Bronze Age “Avengers and JLA.” I know that eventually happened later but I would have liked to have seen it earlier with a true Bronze feel. I have to say that I enjoyed the Amalgam run - it was later but I found that to be kind of fun.
Yes- we most certainly will have a post on the 25th. So Merry Christmas and have your topics ready!
Red, I really enjoyed the report as well. What a great line-up of Bronze Age creators, and it's nice that you got to chat with a few of them.
As to the big events of '70s and '80s, I would add the conclusion of the Warlock saga in the pages of Avengers Annual #7 and Marvel 2-in-1 Annual #2. Similarly, I kind of liked that the last story arc in Nova was sort of wrapped up in the pages of Fantastic Four, in that big space opera story that went on for over 10 issues (i.e., #s 204-214).
Over at DC, the annual JLA/JSA story (issues 207-209) that crossed over with All Star Squadron (issues 14-15) was pretty good as I recall.
Red - awesome report on the Con! I am really happy it was a good experience for you! WHat a lineup!
Regrettably, I missed many of the cross overs and was not really intrigued by the ones that occurred during my prime reading years e.g., Superman-Spidey and Avengers - Defenders. No accounting for taste, I guess, LoL.
But generally, I guess I would be called a "conservative" in the true sense of the word. I remember being a real cynic (at like 11 years old?) when Marvel Team Up 1 came out. I thought it was a money grab. Little did I know what the future would hold, LOL
Quick shout-out to the Scourge of the Underworld! That was a cross-company Marvel event that had no publicity at first, it just snuck up on you!
The first victim I stumbled across was the Melter in an issue of Avengers, which I assumed was tied to an Avengers plot, but nope. Then it was the Hate-Monger in Secret Wars II. I had yet to notice the "Justice is served!" catchphrase the incidents had in common. Then I think my friend started talking about some random murders in the Spider-Man books he was reading, and then I twigged to something going on when a guy in a crowd was thinking of killing Kraven in a West Coast Avengers issue (but backed off).
We eventually figured out it was one guy showing up in all the books killing C-list villains. What an awesome little bit of continuity that was! And then the finale was resolved in a Captain America 2-parter, the finale of which got its own house ad, because every Marvel buff was in on the event by that point!
What a cool way to generate buzz in the comics. Jim Shooter's Marvel was the best!
-david p.
Spoiler: I'm going deeply negative on these.
I only read Crisis for the first time about a year ago. I thought that the battles were way too repetitive in terms of characters and situations, and Perez's style of cramming in so much into such tiny panels really subtracted from the supposedly grand size of the event.
I didn't care for Secret Wars at all, partially because I didn't agree with the character choice, I'm also not a Mike Zeck fan. To this day, I still idly speculate what my dream teams of heroes and villains would be on that battleworld, though.
I was actually kinda stoked for the Teen Titans/X-Men crossover, but thought that Simonson was a horrible choice when the books of both teams were known for an entirely different style of art. Also, bringing Jean Grey back so soon was kinda off-putting and being a Marvel kid, I didn't know who Darkseid was at all.
Overall, these events really left a lot to be desired, and I think that the more recent revamps of them have really benefited from the previous hesitations and mistakes and are actually much better overall.
Excepting that Secret Wars II, and Final Crisis. Warned you I was going negative.
Great to hear from everyone as always!
I have never been to any sort of Con.......they were too few and far between during my comics-reading days. I would love to go to one now to meet some of my favorite creators, many of whom you just talked to, so that had to be pretty cool. Oh, well.....one day.
I remember being really excited at the prospect of the Supes/Spidey crossover, but being sort of disappointed in the final product. It's been a few years, so I can't really remember what it was. Truthfully, I didn't really enjoy any of the crossovers like I thought I would (the Titans/X-Men one has completely faded from memory) and, like Martinex, I longed for the JLA/Avengers during that time.
I tried Crisis on Infinite Earths after the fact, some 25 years or so, and gave up around 2/3 of the way. I didn't think the all the different earths were as confusing as that series was.
I guess the things I remember the most were some of the creative teams' "runs" on my favorite series......Stern/Byrne with Captain America, Englehart/Rogers with Detective Comics, Byrne's Fantastic Four, Mary Jo Duffy/Kerry Gammill on PM/IF, Miller/Janson on Daredevil, Thomas/Ordway in All Star Squadron, etc....When I think about the Bronze Age, I think more of those sort of things than the "Big Events."
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